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Theta nodded.
The baby’s wailing was loud in Theta’s ears as she raced down the steps of Roy’s seedy building and out onto the Bowery. The Third Avenue El rumbled overhead, drowning out her choked sobs. What was she going to tell Flo? If the papers, if somebody like Harriet Henderson, got wind of this story, she’d be ruined. She was trapped. And if Roy found out about Memphis, he’d kill him. She knew that. Theta could still feel Roy’s foul kiss on her mouth as she stumbled down the streets of Chinatown. Feverishly, she wiped at her lips. She cried until she had no tears left, until she was numb and hollowed. Theta wandered the city until dawn. As the day’s first gray stirrings sniffed between the skyscrapers, she knew what she had to do.
HOPEFUL HARBOR
The Marlowe estate was nestled deep in the Adirondacks, nearly a day’s drive from the city. The clouds sat low on the mountaintops and blew out across the valley below. It was colder up here; snow still dotted the ground and the roads were muddy. Weak sunlight peeked between the towering firs. Marlowe’s chauffeur rounded a corner, and the sprawling gray estate came into view, stretched out across the hillside like a huge stone animal in repose.
A gray-haired butler met Jericho at the door. He seemed as if he’d come with the house as much as the furniture and trees. “I’ll tell Mr. Marlowe you’ve arrived, Mr. Jones,” he said, disappearing up the massive, red-carpeted staircase, which was backlit by the most impressive set of stained-glass windows Jericho had ever seen outside a church. Moments later, a shiny, pressed Marlowe bounded down those stairs with the energy of a boy.
“Jericho! Welcome to Hopeful Harbor! Leave your suitcase here. Ames’ll see to it. Let me show you around.”
Marlowe led a wide-eyed Jericho down a long, chandelier-lit hallway whose walls boasted Chinese vases on pedestals, expensive-looking paintings of somber ancestors, and a wooden, gold-leafed coat of arms with a crowned, upright lion at its center under the motto VICTORIA SINE TERMINO: Victory without end. In the billiards room, a bust of Caesar stared down from a long marble mantel while another of Hannibal topped a tall stack of books, all of them about conquerors. There was a dining room the size of a football field where two maids vigorously buffed the silver laid out in a neat line across the gleaming table fit for a king’s court. Jericho had thought that the museum was the most impressive place he’d ever seen. But it was no match for Hopeful Harbor. As they passed from room to room, Jericho kept his eyes open for a possible card reader, but so far, he’d seen nothing.
Back on the first floor, Jericho stopped outside a long room that held a dozen iron beds. “What’s this?”
“We opened the estate to some soldiers during the war. There wasn’t adequate housing. It was the patriotic thing to do. You know, I don’t believe anyone’s stayed in this room since.” Marlowe barked out a hearty laugh. “Jericho, there are just too many rooms in this house—I’ve forgotten half of them!”
Marlowe showed Jericho a dizzying number of other rooms before ending the tour in a tasteful library.
“What do you think?” Marlowe asked.
“Nice castle,” Jericho said.
Marlowe laughed. “Well, every man’s home is his castle, they say. But I saved the best for last.”
Marlowe tipped down two books on the third shelf of a bookcase, and it opened, revealing a secret lift. A grinning Marlowe ushered Jericho inside.
“This is my crowning glory,” he said, his fingers trailing over the golden panel of buttons—B, 1, 2, 3, and S—before selecting the B. The lift descended, and the doors opened again onto a long, shadowy corridor with steel doors lining each side.
Why steel? Jericho wondered.
“This is where the magic happens,” Marlowe said, leading Jericho to the first door on the right. Inside was a shining, white-tiled laboratory that seemed as if it had sprung forth from the pages of Jules Verne. Elaborate contraptions and strange equipment filled the cavernous space. One half of the room had been set up as an operating theater. A sheet-covered hydraulic table sat in the center of the room beneath a spiderlike array of strong lights. Beside it, a smaller metal table held a collection of syringes and vials on a tray, as well as a glass-fronted cabinet that Jericho thought might be an autoclave for sterilizing equipment. The whole arrangement made him very nervous.
“This is the birthplace of the future,” Marlowe said, barely able to contain his pride. “It’s also where you’ll be spending most of your time over the next few weeks as we ready you for your victory lap at the Future of America Exhibition. But there’s time for this later. Come. You must be famished.”
Back in the lift, Jericho pointed to the buttons. “What is the S for?”
“Solarium. There’s one on the roof.”
When Jericho had lived with Will at the Bennington, he’d often escape to the roof to think and to read and to feed the pigeons. From there, he could see the great steel backbone of the city and feel that he was joined to it. He wondered what he could see from the top of Marlowe’s estate.
“Could we see it?” Jericho said.
“I’m afraid the solarium is off-limits,” Marlowe said in a tone that did not invite further questioning.
Jericho and Marlowe sat in the heated sunroom eating their ham sandwiches with tall glasses of cold milk. The sandwiches, smeared with mayonnaise and sweet pickle relish, were delicious, and Jericho ate two.
“Good appetite.” Marlowe grinned. “That’s good. Healthy.” He trained his blue-eyed gaze on Jericho. “What do you remember about the Daedalus program?”
“It cured me. It cured a lot of us. Made us all stronger, faster. And then it reversed. Drove most of the men mad. Made them violent or catatonic. It killed many of them.” Jericho paused. “Or it drove them to kill themselves.”
Jericho slugged back some of his milk. He kept his eyes on Marlowe.
“Like your friend Sergeant Leonard.” Marlowe nodded. He looked sad. “It was one of the darkest moments of my life. All those men. I wanted so much to save them. To make them whole. When it reversed, I was devastated. I felt personally responsible.”
“Perhaps because you were personally responsible.”
Marlowe winced. “Still want to punish me?”
