“It’s not a pretty sight,” she said. “Probably best if I wait.”
For several seconds, they just looked at each other.
“Thanks for standing up for me last night,” Alicia said.
“No thanks necessary. Peter was way out of line.”
She searched his face. “Why don’t you hate me, Michael?”
“Why would I do that?”
“Everybody else seems to.”
“I guess I’m not everybody else then. You could say I don’t have a lot of fans in these parts myself.”
“I hardly believe that.”
“Oh, trust me. I’m lucky I’m not living down the hall.”
A smile, unbidden, rose to her lips; it was good to talk to a friend. “Sounds interesting.”
“That would be one word for it.” He placed the tips of his fingers together, a man making a point. “I always knew you were out there, Lish. Maybe the others gave up on you. But I never did.”
“Thanks, Circuit. That means something. That means a lot.”
He grinned. “Now, seeing as it’s you, I’ll let that nickname slide.”
“Talk to him, Michael.”
“I’ve made my opinion known.”
“What’s he going to do?”
He shrugged. “What Peter always does. Hurl himself at the problem until he bashes his way through it. I love the guy, but he’s a bit of an ox.”
“It won’t work this time.”
“No, it won’t.”
He was watching her intently—though, unlike Peter’s, his gaze held no suspicion. She was a confidante, a co-conspirator, a trusted part of his world. His eyes, his tone of voice, the manner in which his body occupied space: all radiated an undeniable force.
“I’ve thought a lot about you, Lish. For a long time, I believed I was in love with you. Who knows? Maybe I still am. I hope that doesn’t embarrass you.”
Alicia was dumbstruck.
“I see from your expression that this comes as a surprise. Just take it as a compliment, which is how it’s meant. What I’m saying is that you matter a great deal to me, and you always have. When you appeared last night, I realized something. Do you want to know what that was?”
Alicia nodded, still at a loss for words.
“I realized I’d been waiting for you all along. Not just waiting. Expecting.” He paused. “Do you remember the last time we saw each other? It was the day you came to visit me in the hospital.”
“Of course I do.”
“For the longest time I wondered: Why me? Why did Alicia pick me, of all people, at just that moment? I would have guessed Peter would be the one. The answer came to me when I thought about something you said. ‘Someday, that boy’s going to save our sorry asses.’ ”
“We were talking about when we were kids.”
“That’s right. But we were talking about a lot more than that.” He leaned forward. “Even then, you knew, Lish. Maybe not knew. But you felt it, the shape of things, just as I did. Just as I do now, sitting here twenty years later talking to you in a jail cell. Now, ‘why’ is another question. I don’t have an answer to that one and I’ve stopped asking. And as for how this is all going to play out, your guess is as good as mine. Given the general direction of the last twenty-four hours, I’m not especially optimistic. But either way, I can’t do this without you.”
The sound of tumblers; the guard appeared in the doorway. “Fisher, I said five minutes. You need to get the hell out of here.”
Michael reached into his shirt pocket and waved a wad of bills over his shoulder, not even bothering to look as the guard snatched it and skulked away.
“God, they’re idiots,” he sighed. “Do they actually think money’s going to be worth anything this time tomorrow?” He reached into his pocket again and removed a folded sheet of paper. “Here, take this.”
Alicia opened it: a map, hastily sketched in Michael’s hand.
“When the time comes, follow the Rosenberg road south. Just beyond the garrison, you’ll come to an old farm with a water tank on your left. Take the road after it and follow it straight east, fifty-two miles.”
Alicia looked up from the paper. Something new was in his eyes: a kind of wildness, almost manic. Beneath Michael’s controlled exterior, his aura of self-possessing strength, was a man aflame with belief.
“Michael, what’s at the end of that road?”
—
Alone again, Alicia drifted. So, there had been a woman for Michael, after all. His ship, his Bergensfjord.