The Leviathan menace is over. Roxanne Drew is dead. Vicky and Phillip have recovered from their ordeals. Everything seems fine in Collinsport.

But fine does not last long in Collinsport.

And in Washington Cyrus Vance has resigned as Secretary of State. Edmund Muskie has been chosen as his succesor. This means that his Senatorial seat is open, and Maggie eyes it. She is not going to be patient with any misstep by Barnabas, who driven by guilt over Roxanne, is likely to do something unwise.

THE DEEP-SIX

Chapter 1

Reverend Trask looked sympathetically at Sebastian Shaw, huddled alone in his seat. He was overcome with pain, yet he still insisted in saying his farewell to the woman he loved. Trask wondered if Sebastian would be able to.

Sebastian got up, biting his lips. He would say it, no matter what it cost him.

"I don't remember the first time I met Roxie." he began. "I never could. I was just too doped up to notice." he lifted his head and looked at them. "When I met her, I was a junkie, doomed to early death by either hepatitis or overdose. I wasn't worth the time of day. Yet she looked at me and thought that I could be helped and that I could be worth the effort. She picked me up. She helped me to my feet. And all the while she had her own wounds, which refused to heal."

He looked again at the assembled people. Tammy, Joe, Phillip, Julia... they had known the worst about Roxie... They should know the other, too.

"She and I grew close. We needed each other. We loved each other. We wanted it to last forever, and it could have..."

His voice broke. The memories of Roxie talking to him, resting in his arms flooded him.

"She didn't want to. She was afraid that something wrong would happen afterwards. She did not know what it could be, only that she feared it...she had many gaps in her memory when I met her, and she knew that while she did not fully know who she was, it was not safe for us to do that... We used to make plans, both of us, but we could not bring them about."

"Maybe you remember the blackmail bit." his voice became stronger. "I am not proud of it, but little harm came of it. And what harm was doe, we were the ones who suffered the most. That was the worst thing that I knew her to do."

"She used to tell me o what she remembered. What she could remember. From that I know that she was a brave and generous woman. If some of the things she did were known, they would put her face in a postage stamp, at least."

"That was my Roxie. The one I knew and loved."

"There was another Roxie. The one buried within her memories. The one who had once made a bad choice and could not be free of it."

"She paid for it. She would never stop paying. And then her memory came back to her and she knew what she was and what she must do."

"She did not want to. But she had no choice. Some of it was good and she did it... But there were other demands made of her. She learned that she had no future. She learned that our dreams would come to nothing. She knew that she would have to hurt me, force on me the same bad choice that had been forced on her."

"She fought it. She tried to spare me. In her distress she did... she did something she should have never done. But she was too hurt to know better... She should have sent me away, but could not."

"So she did what she did. She tried to buy time. She tried to buy my freedom with that of strangers. She was wrong to do so. She knew it, but was unable to stop herself."

"And then she forced you to kill her. She did it. She wrote it down how it was her choice. She wanted you to think of her as a mad dog to be gunned down for everybody's safety." Tears were now coming down Sebastian's cheeks and he made no effort to wipe them away. "she found the heart to forgive Barnabas and Valerie. She realized that they had been manipulated, too."

Angelique sobbed into her handkerchief. That forgiveness was tougher than the abuse that Roxanne had previously inflicted on her..

"I will ask you that when we bury her today, we bury all our bad memories of her, too. Remember her, if you must, as Harriet Tubman's friend. Remember her at the woman's suffrage movement. Remember the labor organizer, the Spanish volunteer. Remember her as she would wish to be remembered."

Phillip could not keep from rubbing his wrists nervously. They were still sore. Worse was the knowledge of what might have happened to him. He could have joined all the others that Roxanne had recruited and then...

Then he would have as little choice as Roxanne herself had had.

Whose fault was it? Roxanne's? Barnabas'? Angelique's? Or Roxanne's nameless masters'? He didn't know. All he knew was that he had been lucky for not having to make Roxanne's choices.

"Peace be with you, Roxanne Drew." he said, under his breath.

Quentin wondered if he could actually bluff his way out. He suspected that he couldn't. Carolyn was the one woman he could not get around to. The one who knew him better than he knew himself.

"What's the idea, asking for a divorce?" she asked icily.

"I thought it best."

:"Thinking is not your strong point, my dear."

"Come on. You and I both know that you married me for one reason only. You wanted to have children by the name of Collins. But now there won't be any children. You have been fixed" and under his breath he added, like the bitch you are.

Carolyn spread out her lower lip, mockingly. "My, my, my. You are getting brave."

"Maybe I am. I don't want to put up with more of your trash."

"Would you rather go to jail?"

"For what?" I returned all the money, didn't I?"

"What about attempted murder? Of have you forgotten your confession?"

Quentin's jaw dropped.

"Sometimes you amaze me with your dumbness, dear cousin. I wonder what good it does you to live so long since you never learn a damn thing."

Quentin sat down, defeated. "Why?' he pleaded "why not let me go? What good am I to you, now?"

"I will find a use for you, don't worry. I need a replacement for Nicholas now that the sheriff ran him out of town."

"Nicholas job?" Nominal duties were secretary. Real duties were being a whipping boy. To bear smiling all the abuse Carolyn wanted to heap on him. To bend his spine twenty times a day, saying how much he loved being kicked in the ass, and worse "Do you really think that I would want it?"

"It is that or jail."

"I'd rather go to jail?"

"And risk me doing God knows what to your portrait while you are away? And even if I didn't, think about it. Do you know all those lurid tales about homosexual rape in prisons? I regret to say that they are true. You are so pretty that you'll be servicing half the prison in no time at all."

Quentin could not answer that.

"It is your choice, dear cousin." Carolyn said.

Julia hugged herself. In spite of the warm weather she felt cold. And not properly cold... It was Roxanne Drew. Between Barnabas and her they had helped push her into desperation until she could find no other way to escape except kill herself.

That they had been manipulated by unseen forces somehow mitigated their guilt, but did not make it disappear. Nothing would.

And Barnabas was taking it even worse than herself.

Something bridled in her. Something that would not allow to fully pursue that line of thinking. She would not think of guilt, not connected wit Barnabas. There were words that she would never say and would never allow him to speak in her presence.

That was the way it had to be.

It was hard to understand what had happened to her, Vicky thought. Hard to believe that this was 1980. Carolyn was a grown woman. So was Maggie. The world had not waited for her... it kept changing ruthlessly, expecting her to accommodate herself to it.

Hard to believe that the worst part was over. She wasn't a prisoner in the bottle anymore There were no more bottles. The Ring had been destroyed...

Difficult to understand, too that Peter had been lost to her from the start. As Burke had been. They didn't fit with the Leviathan's plans so they were disposed of.

And stranger still was this woman telling her that she was Roger Collins' illegitimate daughter by a chambermaid.

"It matters so little now." she said, more to herself than to Megan. "there was a time when I cared about it, but now..."

"You should care. You could lay claim to some money. Of course, it won't be easy of Carolyn wants to fight you, but I can convince her to settle out of court.

"I don't care about money."

"You always need money. Specially now that you are getting discharged. Take it from me. Tragedy comes after you get your bills paid. It makes a difference whether you have a roof over head while you are being terribly miserable, or whether on top of that, you are outside in the cold rain."

Vicky shook her head.

"And you should consider seriously Barnabas' offer to stay at his place."

"I don't want to... to be a bother to him."

"Bother? He'd love to. He's dying to have someone he can fuss over. If you let someone else mother you, he may be offended."

"I...I don't know."

Megan smiled tolerantly. It was her opinion that if you didn't learn to suffer fools gladly, you were headed for a nervous breakdown.

"Is it because of what he is?" she asked.

"In part, yes." Vicky admitted.

"Phillip had the same misgivings at first. but you ask him now..."

"...I am not sure." Vicky gulped "I...I still remember how it was in 68... wasn't he the tone who kidnapped Maggie that time?"

"Yes. He was. But you'd better not repeat it to anyone, unless you want to get in trouble with Maggie."

"With Maggie?"

"Didn't you know yet? She is now Congresswoman Evans of Maine. She needs to have that old story discussed as much as she needs an extra hole in her head. She made me remove all records of her having ever been in Wyncliffe. If you know what's good for you, you will forget it."

Vicky's eyes widened... to find herself threatened by Maggie, of all people..

"It is the way things are, kiddo. She's got now this assistant in charge of dirty tricks and I am not very sure how far is Sabrina willing to go in her job. You better not find out."

"What could she do?"

"She's already killed once. I grant you that Kira needed killing, but Sabrina might try to do you in, too."

Vicky gulped.

"Anyway, since we are talking about Barnabas, I don't think you should worry about him going back to that. Not unless he's locked up in complete sensory deprivation until his brain turns into tapioca. His head is now in working order and he won't try any crazy stunts. And if he does, tell me and I'll kick some sense into him."

...It seemed so clear, so reasonable, the way Megan said it. Yet still she doubted. Should she really go live with Barnabas, considering what had happened between them? What could have happened if Jeff Clark had not shown on the road?

...Yet where else could she go?

"I wish Vance had given us more time." Maggie grumbled.

Sabrina chuckled "I can't believe you. You could hardly wait until Muskie left his seat to you could take a stab at it. You always wanted to run for it."

"The timing is wrong."

"Anyway, you cannot run for it this election. And that seat won't be contested, either, as I understand."

"I wish I could have had more warning."

"You'll have plenty of time. Get reelected first, then think about positioning yourself for the Senate."

"Yes. I will... Think of it. the first woman senator came form Maine. I can be the next woman senator from Maine, but unlike Margaret Chase Smith I will not inherit the seat from my husband."

And after the Senate what? A cabinet post? The chance to be the first woman President.?"

"One thing" she told Sabrina "keep an eye on Barnabas. I don't want him screwing up the works."