“Why was Magda’s baby in the tent? Why didn’t she get the plague? Or get incinerated?”

He rubbed his forehead. “Magda knew I didn’t want another child. She knew I wasn’t going to leave my wife and marry her. Trade one harridan for another? I don’t think so. Maybe she put the infant in Jennifer’s tent to die, or maybe she thought it would be rescued. When Doris called from the hospital that day, I assumed it was Jenny’s baby, miraculously saved.”

The monstrous nature of his acts, and of Magda’s, turned my legs weak. I had to clutch the doorjamb to keep from collapsing at his feet. Count ten, exhale, center yourself, there’s more to ask.

“What brought Magda back to Kansas after all this time?”

“My evil daemon. You can’t escape your fate. The Greeks knew that, but I never took it seriously until that army colonel showed up asking about her.”

“Baggetto,” I said. “Matt Chastain’s sister came to me today. Do you know that his family cut him off because he was doing a biology degree and he’d come to accept evolutionary theory over biblical literalism? Do you know he’d been accepted into one of your colleagues’ labs but he had to work for you because his mentor left for Seattle? You thought he was clumsy, but he was a boy who’d been in love with science since childhood.

“You take up so much space in the room that no one can breathe around you. You beat Matt down, you stood by while your older daughter collapsed, you let Magda Spirova sacrifice your infant daughter. You got yourself a pet psychiatrist who was willing to say Sonia was delusional and keep her endlessly medicated so you wouldn’t have to think about that horror story in the camp.

“There’s only one useful thing you can do right now: Call your pals, Baggetto, Roswell, the guy calling himself Pinsen. Tell them that by this time tomorrow the whole world is going to have a chance to view that air force film. They can stop hunting for August Veriden and Emerald Ferring. They can leave Sonia alone.”

55
Men in Black

My legs barely held me as I walked to August’s car. I wanted to see Baggetto, I wanted to tell him I knew his fuel-rod story was bogus, I wanted to find out what Spirova had been doing in Sea-2-Sea’s fields, but I had no strength left in me.

I drove slowly to the B and B. Pierre should be there by now. I would pack Bernie into his car and then collapse into sleep.