It had been apparent to the first investigators—seasoned patrolmen who'd thought they'd seen everything—that some power had been released in Coney Eye that wasn't going to be easily defined. An hour and a half after the first car reached Coney Eye, and the patrolman reported to his superiors the condition of the house, several FBI men were on the scene, and two professors—a physicist and a geologist—were on their way from L.A. The house was entered, and the phenomenon in its interior, which defied all easy explanation, judged to be potentially lethal. What was perfectly clear, among countless uncertainties, was the fact that the Grovers had somehow been aware of some fundamental disruption occurring (or about to occur) in their midst. They'd started to desert their town hours or perhaps days before. Why none of them had chosen to alert anyone beyond the perimeters of the Grove to the danger there was just one of countless mysteries the site presented.
Had the investigators known where to look they'd have had their answers from any one of the individuals who'd dragged themselves up out of the ground in front of the Terrace Motel. They'd probably have dismissed those answers as lunacy, but even Tesla—who'd been passionately determined that Grillo not tell his story—would have told it freely now, had she had the strength. The warmth of the sun, indeed the sight of it, had revived her somewhat, but it had also dried the mud and blood on her face and body, and sealed in the deep chill in her marrow. Jaffe had been the first to seek the shadows of the motel. After only a few minutes, she followed. The motel had been deserted by guests and staff alike, and with good reason. The fissure in the lot was one of many, the largest of which spread through the front door of the building, its cracks climbing its facade like earth-born lightning. Inside there were ample signs of how hurried a departure the last occupants had made, luggage and personal items scattered up and down the stairs, the doors that hadn't been unseated by the tremors thrown wide. She wandered along the row of rooms till she found some abandoned clothes, ran herself a shower, the water as hot as she could stand, stripped and stepped in. The warmth made her dreamy, and it was all she could do to drag herself out of its bliss and dry herself. There were mirrors, unfortunately. Her bruised, aching body was a pitiful sight. She covered it as quickly as possible, with items that neither fitted nor matched, which pleased her—Hobo had always been her preferred aesthetic. While dressing she availed herself of cold coffee, left in the room. It was three-twenty when she emerged: almost seven hours since the four of them had driven to Deerdell to make the descent.
Grillo and Hotchkiss were in the office. They'd brewed hot coffee. They'd also washed, though not as thoroughly as she, instead scrubbing masks of clean skin out of the surrounding muck. They'd also stripped off their sodden sweaters and found jackets to wear. Both were smoking.
"We got it all," Grillo said, his manner that of a man profoundly embarrassed, and determined to brave it out. "Coffee. Cigarettes. Stale doughnuts. All we're missing's serious drugs."
"Where's Jaffe?" Tesla wanted to know.
"Don't know," Grillo said.
"What do you mean, you don't know?" Tesla said. "For Christ's sake, Grillo, we shouldn't let him out of our sight."
"He came this far, didn't he?" Grillo replied. "He's not going to walk away now."
"Maybe," Tesla conceded. She poured herself coffee. "Is there any sugar?"
"No, but there's pastries and cheesecake. Stale but edible. Somebody had a sweet tooth. You want?"
"I want," Tesla said. She sipped the coffee. "I suppose you're right—"
"About the sweet tooth?"
"About Jaffe."
"He doesn't give a fuck for us," Hotchkiss said. "Makes me sick to look at him."
"Well, you've got reason," Grillo said.
"Damn right," said Hotchkiss. He gave Tesla a sideways glance. "When this is done with," he said, "I want him to myself. OK? We've got scores to settle."
He didn't wait for a reply. Taking his coffee he headed back out into the sun.
"What was that about?" Tesla said.
"Carolyn," Grillo said.
"Of course."
"He blames Jaffe for what happened to her. And he's right."
"He must be going through hell."
"I don't think the trip's anything new to him," Grillo said.
"I suppose not." She emptied her mug of coffee. "That's wired me for a while," she said. "I'm going to find Jaffe."
"Before you do—"
"Yeah?"
"I just want to say...what happened to me down there...I'm sorry I wasn't more use. I've always had this thing about being buried alive."
"Sounds reasonable to me," Tesla said.
"I want to make it up to you. Want to help any way I can. Just say the word. I know you've got a take on all of this. I haven't."
"Not really."
"You persuaded Jaffe to come with us. How'd you do that?"
"He had a puzzle. I solved it."
"You make it sound real simple."
"Thing is, I think maybe the whole thing's simple. What we're facing's so big, Grillo, we just have to go on instinct."
"Yours was always better than mine. I like facts."
"They're simple too," she said. "There's a hole, and something coming through it from the other side which people like you and me don't even have the capacity to imagine. If we don't close the hole, we're fucked."
"And the Jaff knows how?"
"How what?"
"To close the hole."
Tesla stared at him.
"At a guess?" she said. "No."
She found him, of all places, on the roof, which was literally the last place in the motel she'd chosen to look. Surprisingly, he was engaged in the last activity she'd have expected from him. He was staring at the sun.
"I thought maybe you'd left us to our own devices," she said.,
"You were right," he replied, not looking at her. "It shines on everyone, good and bad. But it doesn't make me warm. I've forgotten what it was like to feel warm or cold. Or hungry. Or full. I miss that so much."
The sour self-confidence he'd evidenced in the caves had entirely drained from him. He was almost cowed.
"Maybe you'll get that back," she said. "The human stuff, I mean. Undo what the Nuncio did."
"I'd like that," he said. "I'd like to be Randolph Jaffe of Omaha, Nebraska. Turn the clock back and not go into that room."
"What room?"
"The Dead Letters Room at the Post Office," he said, "where all this began. I should tell you about that."
"I'd like to hear. But first—"
"I know. I know. The house. The schism."
Now he did look at her; or rather, beyond her, at the Hill.
"We have to go up there sooner or later," she reminded him. "I'd prefer we do it now, while it's light, and I've got some energy left."
"And when we get there?"
"We hope for inspiration."
"That has to come from somewhere," he said. "And we've neither of us got gods, have we? That's what I've traded on all these years, people being godless. That's us now."
She remembered what D'Amour had said when she'd told him she didn't pray. Something about praying making sense once you knew how much there was out there.
"I'm coming round to being a believer," she said. "Slowly."
"A believer in what?"
"In higher forces," she said, with a faintly embarrassed shrug. "The Shoal had their aspirations, why shouldn't I?"
"Did they?" he said. "Were they guarding the Art because Quiddity had to be preserved? I don't think so. They were just afraid of what might break out. They were watch dogs."
"Maybe their duties elevated them."
"Into what? Saints? Didn't do much for Kissoon, did it? All he worshipped was himself. And the Iad."
That was a grim thought. What more perfect counterpoint to D'Amour's talk of faith in mysteries than Kissoon's revelation that all religions were masks for the Shoal; ways to keep the hoi-polloi distracted from the secret of secrets.