§ § § -- May 2, 1984
Roarke had quite a bit to consider after conducting his interview with Adam O'Cearlach. The Irishman seemed to accept all things magical as if everyone on earth dealt with them day in and day out; in fact, he treated them with what appeared to be utter indifference. Roarke wasn't quite sure whether this was good or bad: it could be an advantage, since Adam would not find Roarke's livelihood too peculiar for him; but it could also be a problem because Adam might turn out to lack the necessary respect for the properties of the tools of the trade. Not only that, but there was something about the way Adam reacted to Leslie, and something more about the way she in turn reacted to him.
A couple of days after Adam's arrival, Roarke finally decided, and duly informed Adam, that he was hired on a probationary basis. When he told Lawrence and Leslie about this at dinner that evening, Lawrence, of course, was delighted. Leslie looked dubious but said nothing. Roarke, as always, noted her response to the news, but kept his thoughts to himself. Only time would tell whether Adam would fit in.
"He will be an asset to you," Lawrence insisted happily. "Never doubt it for one moment, sir. I'll have him with me throughout the weekend learning the ropes, and before you know it it'll be as if he's always been here." Leslie's expression grew more dubious still, yet she continued to hold her tongue. Roarke began to get a little suspicious of his daughter's silence; if something bothered her as much as Adam seemed to be doing, she tended to express her opinion as promptly as she tactfully could. Lawrence's presence usually didn't stop her from making her feelings known.
"I appreciate your enthusiasm," Roarke said, "but you will forgive me if I reserve judgment for the time being."
"Well, but of course," Lawrence said generously. "You don't know him as well as I do, so it's only natural for you to be cautious. But you may rest assured…"
"Yes, I know," Roarke broke in. "Thank you, Lawrence."
Lawrence replied, "You're very welcome, sir. Do excuse me. I had intended to show Adam some of the sights before the evening grows too dark." Roarke nodded, and Lawrence left the table, whistling. Once he was out of earshot, Roarke focused on Leslie.
"A penny for your thoughts," he teased her gently.
Leslie looked up and managed a small, twisted smile. "I'm not sure they're worth that much," she said. "I don't know. Something about Adam just bothers me. Maybe it's the way he looks at me."
"How exactly does he look at you?" Roarke inquired.
She considered it for a moment. "Well, this might sound stupid, but…every time I catch him looking at me, he has this…this look on his face. I can't really describe it. It's sort of like…romantic interest, I suppose." She caught Roarke's raised eyebrow and rolled her eyes. "I know, I know. How can I possibly expect to know what that would look like when I've never even had a date, let alone a boyfriend? But I've seen enough couples fall in love on this island to know what romantic expressions look like, Mr. Roarke, and that's the sort of look he has. But there's more to it than that." She fell silent again, considering.
"Go on," Roarke prompted her after a few minutes.
She shrugged in slow motion, holding her shoulders in place for a long, uneasy moment once they'd risen. "There's something…calculating about him. I don't like to say it quite like that, because it probably makes me sound like I think he's a crook or something. I suppose what I mean is that he has something in mind beyond simple…"
"Courting?" Roarke offered.
Leslie let her shoulders fall and smiled faintly. "Yeah, I guess that's a good word for it. To put it bluntly, it looks like he's romantically interested in me, and it also looks like he's brewing up some sort of plan to get me involved with him. If you see what I mean."
Roarke sat back and regarded his empty plate for about ten seconds. "As a matter of fact, I've noticed the looks he's given you," he admitted. "You're proving to be a good reader of faces, Leslie. He does have a strange mien about him when his attention is focused on you. I take it, however, that you don't share his interest."
"Heck no," she blurted. "He's almost ten years older than I am, for one thing. He's too overt in the way he eyeballs me, and it makes me nervous."
"I see," he said contemplatively. "Do you think you can work with him otherwise?"
Leslie started to reply, thought twice about it, then reluctantly met Roarke's gaze and said with a sigh, "I have to be honest. I don't know yet. He hasn't been here long enough."
Roarke nodded once or twice, absorbing her reply. "All right. I appreciate your honesty, Leslie, and I will take your feelings into consideration. You realize, of course, that suspicions alone are not enough to convict a man." His daughter nodded in understanding. "We can only give him time and see exactly what sort of personality we are dealing with."
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Misses Miranda and Marina Lewis stood in front of Roarke's desk late in the morning of May 5, about an hour after their initial arrival on the island, and stated flatly, "We're sick of being identical twins. We want to be completely separate and different from each other."
"But you are," Roarke contradicted. "I see before me two separate, individual human beings."
"Unless ye were Siamese twins once," remarked Adam with a wide grin. A dead silence fell in the room and everyone turned to stare at him; not one of them shared his amusement. Faced with this, Adam's grin faded rapidly and he cleared his throat. Lawrence looked thoroughly mortified, and when he thought no one was watching either him or Adam, gave his friend a sternly sorrowful look that said, I am deeply disappointed in you. Roarke caught it and had to restrain himself from smiling.
Miranda Lewis, having apparently decided that Adam was sufficiently cowed, refocused on Roarke and said, "Well, all right, Mr. Roarke, we're two separate entities, I'll give you that. But we're not different at all."
"Just look at us!" Marina Lewis put in. "We look exactly alike. People tease us about being clones. We have a way of finishing each other's sentences, and sometimes Miranda seems to read my mind."
"And Marina seems to be reading mine," Miranda added. "Even our names are too close for comfort. I mean, rearrange a couple of letters in my sister's name and add one, and you have my name. That's just too much of being alike. We're fed up, Mr. Roarke, pure and simple. That's why we want to be as different as we possibly can, even though it's only for the weekend."
Roarke nodded. "Understandable. Very well then. Lawrence, please bring me that decanter on the table there." Lawrence picked up the cut-glass decanter that usually held only water and presented it to Roarke. On this occasion the decanter contained a transparent concoction the color of emeralds. Roarke raised it to eye level so that everyone could see the contents.
"This potion will produce the results you desire." He gestured at Leslie this time, and she silently handed him two shot glasses. "I shall pour each of you ladies one dose, which will last for the next six hours, at which time you must take another dose. There is a total of five doses for each of you in this decanter." So saying, he filled the shot glasses and handed one to each sister. The women lifted their glasses but stopped cold at the same instant, staring at their respective contents in disbelief.
"Mr. Roarke, my potion's blue!" exclaimed Marina.
"And mine's yellow," Miranda said. "How can that be, when the stuff in the bottle is green?"
"They are the two halves of a whole," Roarke told them, "just like the two of you."
"But we just got done telling you we're sick of that," Marina protested. "We want to be totally different from each other, remember?"
"Precisely, and so you shall be," Roarke told them, "as different from each other as blue is from yellow. Take your first doses now, ladies." Miranda and Marina tipped their glasses back and gulped down the contents; and while they were doing so, Leslie caught sight of something out of the corner of her eye. She focused on Adam and found that he was staring intently at the twin sisters, eyes so wide with transfixed fascination that they had gone as round as half-dollars. She eyed him, wondering what it was about their guests that so interested him.
The twins drained their glasses, and Roarke took them and set them aside. The moment the glasses touched the desk, the room went dark except for what looked like multi-colored spotlights on each twin, along with a white one on Roarke. Leslie, Lawrence and Adam, hidden in the dark, watched intently while the colors spun and gyrated, pulsing and throbbing. At the same time odd noises filled the room -- twisting musical notes that ran up and down several octaves' worth of scales, backdropped by a foundation of eerie "chuffing" noises not unlike those of a locomotive at high speed. The chuffing slowed eventually, and the colors gradually grew calmer, till both light and sound finally faded away and the room's illumination reverted to normal daylight.
While all this had been going on, each twin had undergone considerable physical changes, morphing from their natural state into something altogether different. The twins had started out as golden-haired, gray-eyed mirror images of each other. Now Marina was a brunette with tea-brown eyes, her face elfin with a small pointed chin, her stature almost waifish. Miranda had become a redhead with a thick, waist-length braid, a round face and a slightly pudgy build. Her eyes were now the color of peridots.
Roarke glanced at Leslie, and she produced a mirror from one of his desk drawers, while Miranda and Marina stood gaping speechlessly at each other. When Leslie gave Miranda the mirror, Miranda let out a loud squeal of delight and handed the mirror to Marina, clapping her hands. "This is great, Mr. Roarke!" she cried joyfully.
"You worked a miracle!" Marina agreed with a laugh, minutely studying her new face in the mirror. "I couldn't look any different from Miranda now if I went out and got plastic surgery."
"I'm gratified to hear you're pleased," Roarke said with a smile. "I suggest that now you ladies go out and enjoy the island. And don't forget the potion."
"We won't," the no-longer-identical twins chorused. Miranda grabbed the decanter, and both scampered out the door, laughing and chattering breathlessly as they went. The moment the door closed behind them, Roarke scooped up the shot glasses and handed them to Lawrence, who promptly took them out to the kitchen. Leslie replaced the mirror in the drawer, and Roarke retreated behind his desk again, at which point Adam finally stirred from his spot.
"Mis-ter Rrrrro-arke!" he breathed, clearly awe-stricken. "Never in all me born days have I seen anythin' like that! Ye worked a wonder wi' just a little bit o' liquid! Simply amazin'!"
It was then that Leslie realized Adam's intense scrutiny had not been directed at the twins themselves, but at the potion they'd drunk. Her stomach swooped as if she'd just ridden an elevator fifty stories in ten seconds, and she wondered if Roarke had noticed Adam's inordinate interest.
Roarke gave him an odd look. "Potions are a fairly regular part of granting fantasies," he said.
"Oh aye, but what an astonishin' part! Sure and the leprechauns've never come up wi' anythin' to match that. Ah, sir, ye must teach me how to do that."
Roarke's gaze sharpened at that. "No one else is allowed to handle a potion except for myself," he said, his voice so hard and flat with finality that there could be no mistaking his meaning. "No one."
Adam nodded, but Leslie's stomach refused to settle down, and she knew from past experience that this was a bad sign. Great, she thought. Now we're really in trouble!