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“New York City.” Jiya’s voice was tense. “January 7, 1955.” “Lucy?” It was Wyatt who spoke up first.She shook her head. “Outside my period.” She took a deep breath. “There’s never a time when New York doesn’t have secret societies, of course, but… then and there? I don’t know.”Rufus moved nervously, and then, as if sheepishly, resumed his position behind Jiya’s chair at the console. “It’s early for civil rights,” he offered.“That’s it!” As one they turned to regard Connor. “That’s it, and you’re all philistines.” “Care to enlighten us, Mason?” Denise’s posture was still rigid, but her expression had softened to wry amusement.Connor half shook himself. “Of course. I — it’s Marian Anderson’s Met debut.”“And for the rest of us,” prompted Rufus, “that means…?”“Marian Anderson,” repeated Mason, as if mesmerized. “Marian Anderson. Contralto. One of the greatest recital singers of the twentieth century. An opera house manager wanted her to sing Carmen so badly that he wooed her with white lilies — armfuls of lilies — her Bach was hair-raising — she — ”“Mason,” said Denise sharply, “the essentials.” “Right. Apologies. Marian Anderson, international star, is denied the opportunity to sing in Constitution Hall because of her race, 1939.”“We’re not going to 1939.” There is an edge of desperation to Wyatt’s voice.“So,” continues Connor, “she sings on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial instead.”“Holy shit.”“Quite so, Rufus. Thus she becomes an icon of the civil rights movement. And thus, years later, Rudolf Bing, the newly appointed and infamously autocratic director of the Metropolitan Opera, invites her to become the first Black singer to grace that august stage, and presents it to the institution’s board as a fait accompli.”“Wow.”“Quite so, Rufus. Her career was in its twilight. And she’d always resisted the operatic stage — she was naturally introverted, apparently. But she agreed to do it.” Connor’s face took on a dreamy reverence. “She played a witch. She called up the vengeance of the devil on a corrupt society, and they applauded her for it.”“Holy shit.”“Quite so, Rufus.”“Does this tell us any more about what Rittenhouse wants?” asked Flynn.“I don’t see it either,” put in Lucy. “It’s a decade before Hell’s Kitchen gets bulldozed or gentrified to make way for Lincoln Center, so it can’t be connected to that. If there were riots, I’d know about them.”Connor ran a hand over his head. “I don’t know. But she’s the first. The first Black man sings the role of an Ethiopian king on the same stage weeks later. A Black member of the chorus refuses to wear pale makeup, and becomes a dark face in Rigoletto, in Tosca,, in all of it. And when, in 1966, they open the new opera house, Leontyne Price — a Black woman from Mississippi, who needed customized light filters for her skin — stars in a new opera written about an African queen.”“…Wow.”“Quite so, Wyatt.”“Right,” said Denise crisply. “What do you think we’re looking at, Lucy?”Lucy swallowed. “If we’re looking at assassination, it’s not Anderson — too public, too likely to cause outrage. They might be targeting Bing — apparent accident, poison, simulated heart attack, who knows, but if he’s as influential as Connor suggests…”“More so.”“Okay. Well. There’s that risk. Perhaps even more likely is a protest: like a claque, but more racist, undermining the debut. You said the board was hostile?”“Very.”“So maybe that’s what Rittenhouse is going for: convincing the powers that be that letting Black singers on the Met stage is too great a risk, too great a liability. The Met stage isn’t Montgomery, true, but it’s a headline-generator, and a place where there either is representation in elite culture… or there isn’t.”“Good,” said Denise. “So: likely targets?”“Anderson for blackmail, or maybe abduction, but not murder. Bing for intimidation. The board for persuasion.”“Brava,” murmured Flynn, sotto voce.“Anderson needs to be warned and protected,” continued Lucy. “As for the rest…” She crossed her arms over her chest. “I think having eyes in the theatre is all we can do.”“Right. Rufus, Connor, you can be journalists — for a Harlem publication, if necessary.”“That would be good,” put in Lucy. “There’s a very active Harlem press, lots of small papers, some with short lifespans… one more or less isn’t likely to be questioned.”“Excellent,” said Denise. “And for eyes in the house, Flynn and Lucy, I think. Wyatt,” she continued, in response to his stifled objection, “you’re a very good soldier. And if we had a better idea what we were going to be dealing with we’d have a different strategy. But we need Lucy as an informed observer; that’s non-negotiable. And for responding to whatever Rittenhouse does try to pull in the middle of an opera house — ” Denise sighed heavily — “we need someone who can get people to move with a look.”Flynn’s mouth quirked. “Thank you.”“None of your back chat. Costumes, all of you.”“I cannot believe…” murmured Connor. “Marian Anderson.”“Come on, fanboy,” said Rufus, taking his mentor by the shoulder. “Time to save the world.”
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“Connor,” said Rufus grimly, “is going to be spoiled.”“Mmm,” said Jiya.“He’s going to think it’s all glamor and music and getting to wear suits! I’d like to see him go undercover in the eighteenth century. Or — well, no, I wouldn’t wish getting shot on him…”“Rufus,” interrupted Jiya, “let me fix your tie.”“My tie doesn’t need — ” Jiya, contrary to her stated intention, took the ostensibly offending tie firmly in one hand and stood up on her toes to kiss him. “Oh.”“Yeah.” Still smirking to herself, Jiya smoothed out the damage she’d done to the tie, affectionately plumping out its half-Windsor knot. Rufus sighed. “I get nervous.”“I’ve noticed.”“I love you.”“I know — and no, you have not converted me.”Connor, re-entering, cleared his throat pointedly. “I can, of course, run the specifications myself.”“No, no,” said Jiya hurriedly, tucking a wisp of hair behind her ear. “I have it all set up; I’ll just… do that.”“What’s keeping the others?” asked Rufus, after a moment’s somewhat strained silence.“I would have paid money to see that,” said Wyatt gleefully, as if in answer. “Agent Christopher, on a stool, cursing with a mouthful of pins and threatening Flynn with three kinds of court martial if he either moves or spoils the suit she’s altering, while he holds her tape measure. Amazing.”“What’s amazing,” said Lucy, “is that no one murdered the designer of 1950s underwear in his bed. Who — thought — that — girdles — ” she asked, tugging at folds of wine-colored taffeta — “were a good idea?" She looked up to find the four other occupants of the room staring at her. "What?”“You look,” said Jiya frankly, “amazing.”“Oh! Um, thanks.”“He may have been a misogynist bastard, darling,” drawled Connor, “but you look like a dream designed by Edith Head, if one may be permitted the remark.”“One may. Now, I think you’d better be working for Freedom.”“Aren’t we always?” quipped Rufus.“Very funny.” Lucy deposited her clutch unceremoniously on the desk by the consoles. “Now. Freedom was published by Paul Robeson from 1950 and — ”“Wait,” said Connor, “that Paul Robeson?”“The one who sang “Ol’ Man River” in the original Showboat movie? The very same. He was also a social activist, inspired by the international labor movement, but that’s beside the point right now. The point is that you’re working for his newspaper. It would fold later that year, but you should be okay.”“We’re supposed to save a historic black newspaper with our scoop?” asked Rufus.Lucy smiled at him. “That would be a bonus. I was thinking that would make it harder for people to check up on you. The archives aren’t digitized; Emma and Co. won’t be able to crosscheck your names, even if they are carrying devices in the 1950s.”“They’d do that?” It was Connor who asked the question.“Flynn did,” said Wyatt grimly.“So did I,” put in Rufus.“I do not get paid enough for this,” announced Denise to the room at large. “Decades of law enforcement experience, years with the FBI, top security clearance, time travel for goodness’ sake, and now altering suits.”Flynn, in her wake, looked extremely Brilliantined and not a little sheepish. Though a trained eye might find hasty stitching, he also looked tailored within an inch of his life. Denise, crossing her arms and tilting her head back, surveyed him with professional satisfaction.“The trick,” she explained, to no one in particular, “is to buy something large enough that it’s absurdly boxy, and cut down from there.”“Is it?” asked Lucy, faintly.“You all have your aliases?”Lucy turned away to pick up her clutch. “Rufus and Connor do. I just thought I’d be one of the disinherited Tiffanys.”“They had those?” Wyatt, by the fridge, had settled in with a beer to his role as audience.“Absolutely. Cortland Perry Tiffany ran off to become a Methodist minister.”“As one does,” muttered Rufus.“And I?”Lucy swallowed. “I thought of one of the minor Hapsburgs, but… if all goes well, no one will ask who we are. If we need to establish our bona fides, then you have information from your cousin Otto, or I heard something from my cousin Ruth who’s a chic psychiatrist. If all goes well,” repeated Lucy, “no one will ask who we are.”“Rudolf, perhaps,” suggested Flynn lightly. “Distantly related to the Elphbergs.”“Don’t joke about it,” said Lucy. “The Stewart Granger movie might still be in theaters.”“Does anyone know what they’re talking about?” asked Wyatt.“No,” said Rufus and Jiya in unison.“The Prisoner of Zenda,” said Connor.“Right,” said Denise. “If you’re all quite ready: park the Lifeboat by the docks, take separate taxis, know where your weapons are at all times, don’t use them unless you have to. And good luck.”Amid a chorus of murmured acknowledgements, Rufus squeezed Jiya’s hand and clambered up the steps to the Lifeboat. Flynn and Lucy followed, his hand at her elbow. Last of all, Connor turned, half-sketching a wave before the door hissed shut. And then, with the always-astonishing bending of the atmosphere, they were gone.“I know it’s a Star Wars line,” said Jiya, staring at the place where the Lifeboat had been, “but I have a bad feeling about this.”
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“God,” said Connor, straightening and dabbing at his mouth with a handkerchief. “Please tell me this gets better.”“It gets better,” echoed Rufus dutifully.“One gets used to it,” said Flynn.“For now,” said Lucy, before Connor could object to the quality of his reassurances, “we should strategize, before we get to a part of town where we shouldn’t be seen together.”“This is New York!” protested Connor.“And this is 1955, and we shouldn’t push our luck. Flynn and I will be looking for Bing — and any Rittenhouse activity in the house. You and Rufus will be backstage.”“Press passes for Kevin Franklin and Macon Dead,” muttered Rufus. “The doorman is going to trip if he picks up those novels in about twenty years.”“And the likelihood that he’ll pick up classics of Black feminist fiction?”“Always cheerful, Flynn.”“One of my better qualities.” “Connor,” said Lucy sharply. “We need you,” she said, “to tell us about the opera. When is Anderson going to be on stage? Are there any dangerous props? Is there anything on stage that Rittenhouse could use as a signal?”Connor took a deep breath. “Right." The others fell into step, clustered around him. “Her appearance is brief; she’s only exposed on stage in the second half of Act I. She enters about half an hour into the opera, and sings her great aria. She’s a witch in league with the Devil, and — ”“Oh, great,” said Rufus; “that’s not racist at all.”“And,” repeated Connor, “she summons him in order to tell the future. It’s better than blackface, Rufus. She has a rough table, according to the libretto. It’s sometimes a cauldron in pictures. I don’t know about this production…”“It’s all right,” said Lucy quickly. “It probably won’t be rigged.”“I hate that that reassures me.”“If I may, Rufus… She takes bows alongside the rest of the cast at the end of the act. Presuming that this particular bit of history hasn’t been changed, the Met has passed a rule about solo bows, so she won’t be exposed alone. And the audience loves her.”“That’s the danger point.” Lucy glanced over her shoulder at Flynn. “Rittenhouse could change that.”“The reviews,” said Connor, indignantly, “were glowing.”“And how much column space would they get if there were a riot?” They all fell silent in the wake of Flynn’s question. They walked in front of the electric lights of a deli, the dark front of a bakery with rolled awning and confident cursive.“There is a signal,” said Connor a little hoarsely, “in the second act. Anderson is already off-stage, and will not return, but the bells ring for midnight. The time is one that Ulrica — Anderson — has given to Amelia. It is then that she must pluck the herb by the gallows-tree, to be rid of her forbidden love. You’ll know when it comes,” added Connor pragmatically, “because it comes in the midst of Amelia’s aria, in which she wonders aloud whether she can live without this love. She ought not to feel it — she must not feel it — but if she uproots it, as she uproots the plant before her, will her heart itself not be a landscape as empty, as death-dominated, as that before her?”“…Oh,” said Lucy, after a slight pause.“Opera is weird.”“A little respect, Rufus. You’ll be able to check the table for bombs, by the way; it won’t be on stage in the first scene.”“Great.”“Right,” said Lucy. “Anything else?”“There’s a man stabbed on stage in the final act, but he’s not significant — I mean, he’s a beloved singer, but I can’t imagine — wait.”“Wonderful,” murmured Rufus.“He… he’s Jewish,” said Connor. His expression was withdrawn, worried. “He’s a native New Yorker; he’s adored; he was never an activist, but…”“But what, Connor?” Flynn’s voice was as close to dangerous as it got for fellow-members of the Time Team.“He went to Moscow the following year as a cultural ambassador and… it would look like an accident.”Lucy shivered, and gathered her vintage furs a little more closely around her. “Right,” she said. “Well. We’ll… hope for the best. But we should stay through the end of the opera. And check anyone near the props.” She took a deep breath. “All right. We have our mission. Separate taxis, meet by the stage door.”“Separate taxis,” agreed Rufus. And Lucy watched him and Connor move away, and did not call good wishes after them, but wordlessly placed her hand in the crook of Flynn’s arm.
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“So,” said Rufus, expelling a breath as they stepped out onto the sidewalk of 39th St., “what happens now?”Connor shot him a sidelong look. “You’re the time travel expert, Rufus. I aid and abet your genius, and have no desire to habitually emulate your dangerous expeditions into the past.”“Right. Thanks. But you’re the opera fanboy. What’s the setup?”Connor nodded tightly. “Presuming we get past the doorman…”“You forged Marian Anderson’s signature on a business card; we’re definitely getting past the doorman.”“…She’ll have her own dressing room. Her mother will be there, I think. Backstage, I imagine one theatre is much like another in the matter of ropes and pulleys and irritated lighting technicians, but I don’t know the details for this one.”“Gotcha. So we split up.”“What? Rufus, I hardly think dividing our resources even further is — ”“Listen, we don’t need two reporters inside an opera star’s dressing room. What we do need is two sets of eyes on whatever racist super-villain crap Rittenhouse is trying to pull. So you do Marian Anderson — not like that, obviously, but you know — and I check what’s going on with the stagehands. I was a tech kid for school shows back in the day. Also I saw that Marx Brothers movie once.”Connor sighed deeply. “Right. Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood.”“Absolutely,” said Rufus. “That. Let’s go.”***As Rufus predicted, they were successful in gaining entrance, the doorman being far more concerned with autograph-hunters than with hardworking Harlem reporters. Rufus, with a sketched nod, departed at a purposeful stride into the dim interior of the theatre. Which left Connor, much to his discomfiture, outside the clearly-labeled doorway of a twentieth-century icon. No pressure, then. The hallway was well-trafficked enough that he was disinclined to loiter. He knocked on the door. A moment later, it was opened by a woman twenty years his senior and nearly a head shorter than he.Connor Mason took a deep breath. “Mrs. Anderson,” he said, “I have no wish to disturb your daughter. I won’t — I don’t even need to talk to her. But I believe she will be safer if I am in the room.” He felt guilty about that even before he saw the fear come up in her eyes, familiar fear born of familiar knowledge: they do not want us to live. “What do you know?”He glanced over his shoulder almost instinctively. But no matter who was or was not standing in that hallway, with the hushed bustle of the opera house going on around them, he could hardly tell her the truth. Well — perhaps he could tell a part of it. “Mrs. Anderson,” said Connor evenly, “I am a great admirer of your daughter’s, and I have reason to believe that there are those here tonight who wish her ill. I wish her to have nothing but the triumph she deserves. That you both deserve,” he added; “that we all deserve.” The woman’s weathered face was motionless, almost expressionless, but she stepped aside, and closed the door quietly behind them both.The woman sitting at the dressing table turned to regard him, and his throat closed on his intended overture. He had not expected this; the photographs showed her radiant, but haggard and disheveled as an eighteenth-century prophetess. Here and now, without stage makeup on, she regarded him out of eyes that were large and luminous, and the very bones of her were beautiful.“Speak your piece,” commanded Mrs. Anderson, from behind him. Connor knew her to be no less iron-willed than her daughter, and no less passionate. “Mrs. Anderson,” he said, “Miss Anderson. My name is Macon Dead, and I am with the Harlem newspaper Freedom. I don’t mean to disturb you…”“Tell her why you’re here.”Connor swallowed. He saw the rapid pulse in the contralto’s throat. “I’m here to protect you,” he said, and hoped he did not sound ridiculous. “It sounds presumptuous, I know, but I am afraid that there are those here who mean you harm.”“There are always,” said Marian Anderson, “those who mean us harm. Sit down, Mr. Dead.” There was a slight lilt to her voice, the memory of a Virginian childhood beneath decades of vocal training. Gripping the back of a slightly battered chair, Connor obeyed. “You say you’re a reporter.” She had turned back to her table. “Don’t reporters usually have questions to ask?”“If you’re willing to answer them. But my chief aim, as I told your mother, is to make sure that nothing stands between you and your success.”She met his eyes in the mirror. “A great deal of it comes down to chance, in the end. But I know my foundation. I will be able to give a performance. Even if,” she added wryly, “it may not come up at all to my own standard.”“I — it will be the honor of the house to hear you, Miss Anderson.” There was silence for some few minutes, while the shadows of Ulrica’s face came into being under Marian Anderson’s cheekbones. Connor dutifully made markings on his notepad that he hoped would pass as plausible shorthand.“Do you know, when Bing first made me the offer, I wasn’t sure he was serious.”Connor did not have to simulate avidity in reapplying himself to his notes. “Weren’t you?”“Not at all. He simply came out and asked me, at a party. No preamble, no flattery. I just looked at him until he asked me again. And then he wasn’t sure I was serious in answering him. But here I am.”“Here you are.” He consciously stopped himself from pressing his pencil into the pad. He told himself that he should be able to summon — or at least project — some emotion other than awe.“In all honesty,” she said, “it was more of an opportunity than I realized.”“For — for our race, do you mean?” He could not bring the word Negro across his lips. She smiled at him, and Connor Mason reminded himself firmly that Marian Anderson was married. “No,” she said, and there was laughter in the marvelous voice. “For me.” “Would you be willing to expand on that, Miss Anderson?”“I don’t think I realized,” she said softly, “what was possible. That this was possible: for me to sing an aria like this, on the stage — on this stage. For our race, if you like. You may tell your readers, Mr. Dead, that I think it’s true for all of us; that perhaps we don’t know what we can do until we are really challenged.”It was Connor’s turn to smile, a little ruefully. “Miss Anderson,” he said, “I am quite sure that you are right.”
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Stealth observation was not changing Rufus’ initial assessment of opera as weird. There were painted backdrops for what looked like a nobleman’s study — eighteenth-century, Rufus guessed, based on more up-close-and-personal experience than he’d ever thought he’d have. Laid out with regimental precision on a desk was an array of props including letters, fans, a dagger, and a couple of skulls. The elderly man presiding over the desk was clearly the props master, and there was a ferocious glitter in his blue eyes. Rufus decided not to tangle with the Props Prussian. The dagger could wait. He changed his position, leaned against a new beam, and scribbled a few more notes. Staying out from underfoot and not bothering people trying to do time-sensitive tasks seemed like the best strategy for gaining goodwill. “Hey,” said a passing stagehand, in an accent that reminded Rufus irresistibly of the Godfather movies, “get moving.” As Rufus put his hand to the supports of the canvas, he longed for an earpiece so that he could murmur to an invisible listener: I’m in.“You’re not Jim’s cousin,” said Rufus’ anonymous benefactor accusatorily, when they’d set down the piece of scenery.“Uh… no.” Best to stick to one alias. “No, I’m not.” He flashed his ID. “Kevin Franklin. I’m a newspaper man.”“Uh-huh.” Rufus shrugged in a manner he hoped was disarming. “So I thought I’d look around. See how the place is really run. Not like the paper needs another column on what the diva was wearing, right?”The man grunted in agreement, and apparently decided that he had wasted enough of his valuable time on conversation, as he departed to whatever tasks awaited him. Well. Rufus surveyed his new surroundings. He wasn’t entirely sure whether he’d been temporarily mistaken for someone else or had just opportunistically misinterpreted someone telling him to get out of the way. But here, at any rate, he was. The canvas he’d been helping to carry turned out to have trees on it, twisted and barren, the woods of a child’s nightmare. Creepy. There was a giant heap of stones made out of papier-mâché. Reviewing what Connor had told them of the opera, Rufus concluded that the stones must be there for… reasons. There was a table of sorts in the corner — a desk? — but it definitely looked more like Nobleman’s Study furniture than a Scary Witch Accessory. Making sure he was alone, Rufus picked his way further into the maze of stuff-needed-later. And there, behind the Stones of Mystery, it was. Runes, thought Rufus. Runes! He was pretty sure they made zero sense either in eighteenth-century Sweden or in the version of colonial American history where Boston had a governor (for reasons) but here they were, larger than life, decorating the side of a cauldron. “If you ask me,” muttered Rufus, “it looks like it wandered out of a Disney movie.” But here it was, ready to be prophesied over by Marian Anderson. Rufus approached it cautiously, tapping its surface — papier-mâché again — and running his hand over the runes. It had to be sturdy enough to be moved, and anything done to it couldn’t change the weight enough to be noticed. That is, unless Rittenhouse had bothered to plant an opera stagehand, which just seemed excessive. More out of curiosity than from any other motive, Rufus leaned over the lip of the giant cauldron. Twice as much surface to investigate… With an engineer’s thoroughness he swept his hand over the inside. And there, at the bottom, with the edge of the cauldron pressing uncomfortably against his hips, he found it. Grunting slightly, Rufus straightened, and looked at what he held in his hand.“Hey,” said the voice of the laconic stage-hand. “Whatcha doing? Whatcha got there?”Rufus decided to ignore the first question. “A nasty trick is what I’ve got here.” He grabbed the other man’s hand and slapped it into his open palm. “She stirs that cauldron, right?”“Yeah?”“But I’m guessing the Metropolitan Opera doesn’t actually want its singers inhaling sulfurous fumes when the devil is summoned on stage.”“They…” The color drained from the other man’s face as he regarded the packet in his hand. “Rat poison,” he said hoarsely.“Yeah. Might have been a nasty accident.” The man looked up sharply; the emphasis was not lost on him. “I don’t know anyone who would’ve done this,” he said quickly. “Honest to god,” and he crossed himself and spat. “You won’t — you won’t put it in your paper?”Rufus took a deep breath, and wished he could look intimidating for more than two seconds at a time. “No. I won’t. Presuming nothing else happens.”“It won’t,” said the man. “It won’t, shit, I… I’d better tell Bill to double-check his props.”Rufus followed in the man’s wake, congratulating himself. The cauldron had been disarmed, the Dagger of Stabbing would be checked on, and he was the hero of the hour. Not, he imagined, that Connor would be capable of absorbing this information. Oh well. He could always tell Jiya. His only job now was to worry about how things were going front-of-house.
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Lucy felt a little dizzy. The opera house was ablaze with light, its nineteenth-century architecture gleaming as if in defiance of grime. Other patrons, elegantly dressed, surrounded them on the pavement, proceeded resplendent and self-assured through the house’s heavy wooden doors. “I don’t — ” she began.“You’ll be fine,” said Flynn, and then they were over the threshold.Curiously, she found herself soothed by the very unfamiliarity of the atmosphere within the house. A line from “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” floated into her head: nothing very bad could ever happen here. Elegant women in their chignons and silks, men in their tailored suits moved easily and without haste, as if in appointed patterns. No voices were raised. Though there was no apparent order to the crowds who ascended the staircase or approached the box office, there was also no apparent panic. The light of the place, the patterned floors — all seemed removed from the world outside, determined by its own immemorial customs. She had presumed that she and Flynn would be required to spend some time assessing potential targets, but he was heading, with the same unhurried ease as those around them, towards the staircase.Before she could formulate an inquiry that would sound innocent to listening ears — Darling, do you have them? — Flynn was handing a pair of tickets to one of the caped ushers.“How did you…?”“Picked a man’s pocket,” murmured Flynn.“But won’t he…”“And left a hundred-dollar bill as his consolation prize.”“Denise will be furious.”“The FBI can afford it.” Lucy forced herself to take a deep breath. “Relax, Professor. You analyze data. You draw conclusions. No one expects you to be a universal expert.”“Speak for yourself.”“Very well. I don’t expect you to be a universal expert.”The second deep breath was easier than the first. “I have taught a lot of survey courses.”“That’s the spirit.”Her laughter was shaken, fragile — but it felt strangely pleasant to pretend that it was genuine, that they were simply two people taking pleasure in each other’s company. Briefly she pressed his arm. ***Settling her folds of taffeta around her, she found herself surprised that they had so advantageous a view of the house, looking down over the stalls and the diamond horseshoe. And then it occurred to her that she shouldn’t be. “…You eavesdropped, didn’t you?” He merely raised his eyebrows at her. “You eavesdropped!” repeated Lucy, her tone only half-accusatory. “You knew that the — that our seats would be in one of the boxes.”“Naturally.”“Sometimes I think you’re frighteningly good at this.”“Only sometimes?”She smiled at him. “Shut up.” She leaned forward to scan the auditorium, the mother-of-pearl opera glasses awkward in her hand. Nothing. Nowhere could she spot a sleek twenty-first century watch or visible earpiece; none of the loiterers seemed to be purposeful.“Why is everyone milling around?” “They’ll take their seats soon enough.” There was a moment’s pause. “Lucy.” She knew him well enough to know that her name was a plea. She imagined a movement in the corner of her eye, but when she turned back to him, his hands rested decorously on the arms of his own seat.Lucy exhaled, folded her gloved hands in her lap, forced herself not to grip them together too tightly. At least, she thought, any movement would be conspicuous in the silent and darkened house. At least they weren’t in the eighteenth century, or even the nineteenth. And at least they were together.***The prelude did nothing to soothe her nerves. Plucked strings and rumbling drums foretold no good. The brass issued warnings in a minor key. When the curtain rose, the calm was an obviously artificial one. Even the courtiers’ wishes that their lord might rest in peace seemed disturbingly ambiguous. The routine bustle of the governor’s levée proceeded impenetrably. When the curtain fell on the first scene, she was scarcely enlightened.“The baritone,” remarked Flynn amidst the applause, “is warning the tenor of a design against his life; he refuses to listen.”Lucy gave him a sidelong smile. “Typical.”“He does, however, declare that he should see the witch who is in league with the devil, and test her powers by asking her to foretell his future.” Involuntarily Lucy shivered. She consulted her program: just over five minutes for the scene change, and half an hour for the second scene.“Still nothing?” she asked, without looking up.“Still nothing.”Lucy continued to study her program; nothing about their conversation should tempt others to listen in. “If they’re planning a disruption, I’d expect to see them striking up conversations with strangers — trying to take the temperature of the room, or change it.”“Mm.”“As it is, they must be coordinating with each other, which should be easier to disrupt.”“Say the word, and I’ll dive into the stalls — flatten four of them at once.”“Don’t joke about it.”“I’m incorrigible,” he murmured, as the curtain rose; “didn’t you know?”The second scene was crowded: a chorus of the general populace was clustered around what Lucy could not help but think of as a clearly liminal space, marked by two entrances, flanked by skulls. When Marian Anderson emerged from an inner door, Lucy released a breath. So far, so good: Connor and Rufus have kept her safe. She truly was magnificent, Lucy thought. Her voice, more worn than on Connor’s records, trembled; but it filled the house as she summoned the ruler of the abyss, prepared to read the fates of those assembled. Flynn leaned over. “She tells the tenor,” he whispered against her ear, “that he will die by the hand of a friend. I have one.”“Where?”“Stalls. End of the row. I’m getting him out before the bows.”She nodded tightly, and he vanished from her side. Below them, on the stage, Marian Anderson was still the central figure. Don’t read our fates, Lucy thought, a little wildly; don’t read our fates. She could well believe that fate was something worked out in some infernal sphere: the death of a man at his friend’s hand, the death of innocents, the erasure of a beloved sister from the world. The tenor, clearly, was having none of it, contemptuous and smiling. Once again, Lucy thought, a case where men should just believe women.Belatedly it was borne in on her that she had no idea where Flynn was. She scanned the auditorium anxiously. She had become too absorbed in what was happening on stage, and now… Nowhere could she see a disturbance in the audience. On stage, the voices wove in and out: the man laughing at his own danger, the conspirators with designs on his life, the friends who feared for him. The trumpets brayed out the identity of the governor; Verdi drove the tension towards its climax — and a movement caught Lucy’s eye. Almost opposite her, at the front of a box on the other side of the house, a woman was playing with her earring. Not an earring — not an earring, to be fiddled with so insistently at such a moment. And Lucy, watching her, became increasingly certain of who she was, and of what she was trying to do.
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The curtain fell, and the applause rose, and the agent in the stalls wasn’t acknowledging communication. Jessica half-turned at a movement at the back of the box. The caped figure of an usher became visible against the doorway, and she relaxed. “A message from the man in R117.” Finally. She didn’t know what he thought he was doing but — the next minute, her train of thought was interrupted as the usher, without breaking stride, chopped the agent on his right in the neck. The one on his left got a thumb in the windpipe. Jessica, rising, moved forward to do something about it — she, at least, was not unarmed — and the next minute gasped with pain. She hadn’t even noticed the figure behind the first assassin, hidden by the usher’s cape. But now her ear smarted and throbbed, and Lucy Preston, with a gaze like steel, dropped the radio receiver onto the carpet and ground it mercilessly under her Cuban heel. Behind them, under the roar of applause, under the murmuring of the audience, the three men were on the ground, creating a scene of eerily silent chaos.“So,” said Lucy, “what’s the second part of the mission?”If she expects an answer, she’s more naive than I thought. Jessica tried to take control of her whirling thoughts. “What makes you think there’s a Part Two?” Her voice trembled a little.“Don’t play dumb with me, Jessica.” Jessica swallowed. She couldn’t tell, she wouldn’t tell, and she had no idea how they found out about the knife. Was it all bluff? Behind them, Marian Anderson took her bows, and Jessica tried not to think about what Emma’s reaction to learning of this debacle would be. Debacle was hardly too strong a word. They’d tried a multi-pronged attack on an event obscure enough that they’d hoped to avoid notice altogether… and yet here she was, staring down Lucy Preston in an opera box, reflecting on how impractical dresses were for hand-to-hand combat. Her best chance was that Lucy wouldn’t be expecting the knife. But Emma hadn’t wanted the prissy bitch dead. Jessica pressed her lips together; she was more than ever convinced that vendetta was a fool’s game. She could just stab her, and damn Emma’s reaction. Sorry I killed your nemesis for you. But there was always the chance of using her for information. Or bringing her over to Rittenhouse, where she belonged. Was that such an insane idea? Privately, Jessica was of the opinion that psychological torture followed by a stint on the Western Front wasn’t exactly destined to go down in the books as a failsafe persuasion method.“All right,” said Lucy; and although her voice, too, wavered, her tone was hard. “Play it that way, if you want. But what are you going to do? Scream for a real usher? You don’t want the authorities in this mess — you have more to lose than we do.”“And what are you going to do?” She hoped the bravado sounded plausible. “Twist my arm till I give you information? You’re too nice for your own good.” In the melée behind them, a bone snapped; a man gave a stifled scream.Lucy took a step closer — almost within arm’s reach, if only… “We’re going to talk about how it’ll look for you if you go back to Emma with half your team gone and none of your objectives achieved. Now that you’re not spying for Rittenhouse, what makes you think you’re still valuable to them?”Jessica lifted her chin. “It’s not like that.”“Oh, really?” Jessica had the disturbing conviction that there was something the other woman wasn’t telling her, but she couldn’t begin to guess what it was. Just because she’d betrayed Rittenhouse, Lucy couldn’t imagine what it was like to have loyalty rewarded? Behind them came the decisive sound of flesh hitting flesh, and then silence. Somehow, she wasn’t surprised to see him emerge from the tangle of bodies, shaking himself like an animal emerging from water. His gaze slid over her indifferently to find Lucy. He gave her an infinitesimal nod, and began to arrange the bodies. Jessica suppressed a slightly hysterical giggle in her throat: corpses to the left, living to the right. He worked swiftly, silently, checking that the two unconscious men were firmly bound, securely gagged with their own handkerchiefs.“You aren’t going to kill them?” The involuntary question emerged in a whisper.He looked up, and held her eyes. “No.”“I told Lucy.” Her teeth were starting to chatter. “You’re too nice for your own good.”“Nice,” said Garcia Flynn, as he took her by the elbow, “is the last thing I am.”***She stumbled a little as he led her out between the bodies. She still gripped her satin clutch tightly in one gloved hand. And she wished that she’d shot the bastard in the saloon. No chance for a shoot-out in the halls of the Metropolitan Opera, no chance to take down this terrible man with the terrible pity in his eyes. She could scream, of course. She could yell rape and bloody murder, and have all the patrons interrupt their light-voiced chatter; she could weep on the shoulder of some sympathetic matron, and have Garcia Flynn, once again, carted off to prison. But then what? Interviews? Identity papers? What about the four prone men in the box? And what about the knife?Jessica took a deep breath. The interval had to be at least half over by now. He couldn’t have more than ten minutes at his disposal to do… whatever he’d planned with her. She leaned her weight back against the pressure of his hand. What were they planning to do to her? And at this point, was there a better outcome, for her, than getting out and getting back to the Mothership? Flynn wouldn’t leave her time to get backstage. Flynn pushed open a swinging door with his left hand, and they found themselves in a stairwell very clearly designed for the patrons who did not arrive in furs, but who filed up to the upper galleries in worn shoe-leather. “So,” he said, as he spun her to face away from him. “Talk, Jessica Logan.”“What about?”“Anything that gives me a reason to argue we should try to get you out.”“…What?” “You heard me.” The peeling wall was rough against her cheek, his grip on her wrist harder than handcuffs, but curiously devoid of anger.“I don’t understand.” If she was lucky, she could stall for time. She still had her other hand, her clutch trapped between the banister and the hard swell of her abdomen. The bag was too small for a gun. That, Jessica had to admit, was a clever bit of strategy.“This is war, Jessica Logan.”“Don’t call me that.” She bit off the words, sharper than she meant them to be.“This is war,” repeated Flynn, his tone unchanged. “And there will be casualties.”
And you first.
“They can kill innocents as easily as save them.” In his voice she could only hear exhaustion. “They have. They will.” She had her hand inside her bag now, clutching the handle of the knife. “You may be useful to them,” continued Flynn, “but they will not value you, you or your child, any more than — ” Jessica wrenched herself around against his grasp, and lunged.She knew it was a failure almost before the movement was complete. He ducked sideways, relinquishing her wrist, and the blade slid harmlessly against a rib, steel scraping against bone. He caught her knife hand in both his, breaking her grip against his thigh, and the bright trail of blood mocked her. So little her strength was worth: a bit of mess, and no more.He exhaled, and shifted to pinion her arms as he should have done from the beginning. “Jessica Logan.” She forced herself to meet his eyes, forced herself not to look down, not to try to follow the path of her stroke, not to see whether his blood would get on the blue silk of her dress.“I told you,” she said, “not to call me that.” Beside her foot the knife still gleamed, a beautiful object. She could not conceal her surprise when he moved to step on it, and knelt to pick it up, together with her fallen clutch. It wasn’t until he was facing her again that Jessica told herself she should have tried to knee him in the head.“You can go back,” he said, “with this.” And he dropped the bloodied knife into her bag. “It doesn’t stab a good man in front of an audience of thousands, and you get to show off your little triumph to Emma. Everyone wins.”“But…” She moistened her lips. “What makes you think Emma won’t kill me for — for failing?”He shook his head slightly. “Not now. Not now, when you’re a pawn en prise. Besides — ” he smiled, and it was an expression entirely feral — “Emma knows me. She’ll believe that I took care of the other agents.”Jessica took another breath. “You could kill me.” As if in answer, he took her by the forearms and marched her down the stairs. Behind her, his breathing was only slightly uneven. “You could kill me,” she said again, when they were standing in the darkened entryway, winter air and pale electric light streaming around the edges of the door to the street.Behind her, Flynn sighed. “I have a great deal of blood on my hands, Jessica Logan.” Roughly he turned them both to the side, got the door open. He half-shoved her onto the New York sidewalk, dropped her clutch next to her. “I’m not going to add yours.”The door swung shut and locked behind him, an ordinary and utterly defeating barrier. Jessica shivered. Gingerly she bent to pick up her bag from the sooty slush at her feet. She put up her hand for a taxi, and told herself that the tears stinging in her eyes were the result of nothing but the winter wind.
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Flynn wondered if he was going to regret this. He’d underestimated Jessica, and he’d let her go, and he could only hope that the second would not prove as great a folly as the first. He exhaled. Carefully he rolled his shoulders back, one after the other, taking stock. He buttoned his tailcoat without examining the stab wound; it was shallow, and would do better if he didn’t try to loosen the shirt that was already clinging to it, sticky with clotting blood. He sighed. Another mission, another scar… and he sincerely hoped that he wouldn’t find himself facing Jessica Logan again any time soon. She was only an average shot, and had no idea about how to aim for a man’s guts to do real damage. But she was also resolute, and ruthless, and — to all appearances — thoroughly convinced of the justice of her cause. And she was Wyatt’s wife. Flynn shivered in the draft, and headed back up the steps of the opera house. The brightly-lit corridors seemed slightly distant, slightly unreal. The prelude to Act II had already begun. With that wickedly theatrical-looking dagger out of the picture, they wouldn’t have to stay for the remainder of the opera. But perhaps (the strings arced gracefully upwards) it would be only sensible to do so. Small odds of finding Connor and Rufus in the backstage chaos in any case. Flynn ducked back into the box where the Rittenhouse agents lay, retrieved the usher’s cape. He descended the stairs at the end of the corridor — a little stiffly, truth be told — and handed the cape to the uniformed man at their base. “Mr. Michaels.” The usher took it with a half-salute. Once again the Communist menace had been evoked and vanquished. Idly Flynn wondered if these pretexts would find their way into history books, the red scare made incarnadine by their efforts. He’d have to ask Lucy.“Miserere,” sang Milanov, “miserere”; and Flynn felt his shoulders slump in relief as he entered their own box to find Lucy there: erect, attentive, immaculate, safe. He slid into the seat next to her as the tenor declared his presence on stage. Without turning her head, Lucy leaned over to him, whispered: “What’s he saying? All right?”Flynn took a deep breath. “Do you not know that I would remain yours, even if my heart ceased to beat? Yes.”Her glance was sudden, her eyes wide and bright in the darkness. I would give my life, sang Peerce, I would give the universe, for a single word. Lucy returned her eyes to the stage. Very well, yes, I love you. The soprano’s admission was wrung from her, but was the prelude to increasingly frenetic exchanges. And then came the glorious repetition, the uncontrollable, ecstatic repetition: yes, yes, I love you, and the reply from the man who was irradiated by love. And then — to Flynn’s not inconsiderable shock — Lucy’s small hand closed over his.He was conscious of holding very still. He expected her to let go when the hair-raising duet was interrupted. But as the conspirators became more insistent, as the ensemble became more charged, she tentatively moved to lace her fingers with his, and he turned his palm upwards to meet hers.Against every professional instinct he possessed, Flynn found himself relaxing. They hadn’t acquitted themselves too badly, all things considered. Connor and Rufus had done most of the work, literally behind the scenes, to ensure that Marian Anderson had made her debut as scheduled, and was received as she deserved to be. And between them, he and Lucy had — it would seem — successfully dismantled the Rittenhouse cell. Flynn let his head fall back against his seat. On stage, the wife who no longer loved her husband and the husband who no longer trusted his wife risked their lives and their reputations for each other. Surely he hadn’t done the wrong thing, letting Jessica go? Had there been any other choice?Even during the applause after the act, Lucy did not release his hand. “Hey,” she said, after a few minutes. “You okay?”He opened his eyes, smiled at her. “Yes. Yes, absolutely.”Lucy scrunched her eyebrows together and quoted at him: “ ‘Yes’ is a comfort; ‘absolutely’ is not.”“Sorry, Professor.”She glanced over her shoulder at the couple behind them, spoke quickly, under her breath: “What about Peerce?”“He’s fine. He’s safe to the end — no worries about stamina.”She smiled; briefly it occurred to him that, even with the promise of their partnership written in her hand, he had never imagined this. “Good,” said Lucy, and the third act began. Verdi knew, of course, that the worst betrayals were the most intimate. “O death,” sang the baritone, “in the widowed heart! O lost sweetness, and o hopes of love!” And Flynn reminded himself of when and where they were, as Lucy clasped his hand.The conspirators made their vow, with the baritone won to their side. Flynn roused himself in the interval between scenes. “You haven’t seen anyone — anyone else we know?”Lucy shook her head. “No, no one. And I checked, before coming back: no one.” She took an uneven breath. “We can meet our friends at the stage door afterwards, go for drinks.”“That will be nice.” The curtain rose, returning the action to the original setting of the governor’s study, now in the cheerless hours of the night. Even if I must lose you forever, o light of my life, my love will reach you, wherever you may be. Even then, your memory will be locked in my heart. Beside him in the darkness, Lucy was quiet, motionless. Still she had not relinquished his hand.The masked ball opened; all the actors had come on stage now; all pieces were on the chessboard. The allegiances were clear. Though some might be unwitting accomplices, and some might be unwilling bystanders, there could be no doubt as to how things would end. The assassin was given his mark. The soprano, desperate, pled with the tenor to flee, and even that action could not save his life.Lucy leaned over, her breath warm. “Tell me.”Flynn moistened his lips. “I cannot fear death,” he murmured. “I cannot, for stronger than death is the breath of your love. It intoxicates me, and I shall save you, though my heart break for it.”The baritone stabbed the tenor with the knife that was only a prop, and Lucy’s hand trembled a little in his. In the aftermath of violence, an eerie calm descended upon the stage. Cries of horror gave way to hushed awe in the face of death, and the harps promised hope of — perhaps — a better future in this world, as well as the next.When the curtain fell, Lucy did remove her hand; before the house lights were up, she was digging in her clutch for a handkerchief. The couple behind them departed in a suave swirl of scent. Flynn was conscious of getting up a little too slowly, taking a little too much weight on his wrists. And he could not quite suppress a grimace as he straightened.“Flynn.” Lucy’s tone was sharp. “You’re — ”“I’m fine.” There was tension in every line of her. Seeing her trembling hands, he longed to take them again in his. “I’m fine.”Lucy swallowed. “Someday you’re going to tell me that, Garcia Flynn, and it’s going to be a lie.”He smiled. “Probably. But not tonight.”A few moments longer she held his gaze, her expression troubled. Then she nodded a little, as if coming to a decision. “Not tonight.” He held out his arm to her — in invitation, in apology. “May I have the pleasure of escorting you home?”Lucy slipped her arm through his, and sighed a little, relaxing momentarily against his side. “You are incorrigible,” she informed him. “And yes, you may.”