CHAPTER 8
When all of our meals had pretty much been eaten and Jack and Darla began to give each other "the look," I said, "Why don't I flag down the server and ask her to bring the check. Then we can head back to Dad's and take a look at the dictation."
"I'll get the check and you take care of the tip," Jack suggested, still gazing affectionately across the table at Darla as he spoke.
"All right," I agreed, shrugging. Then, "If you like, I'll drive home so you two can have a little time alone together in the back seat."
"It's only five and a half blocks," Jack reminded me, also shrugging. "What's the point? Anyway, we oughta find out if the girls want to go to Dad's with us, or if they'd rather go home. Jamie may not even be interested in looking at the dictation."
"No, I'm not," my date admitted—to my dismay. "Since I'm not really directly involved in any of this (and I prefer to keep it that way), I think I'd rather go home. I left my car at Aunt Darla's, so you can just drop me there."
"Darla, what about you?" Jack queried gently, looking at her more . . . tenderly than I'd ever seen him look at anyone . . . except Joey when he was still alive.
"I hate to say it," Darla replied, smiling softly at my brother, "but I should go home, too." Don't misunderstand me, Jack," she added quickly when his face fell. "I've thoroughly enjoyed spending so much time with you. But I have to get up early tomorrow: I do still have a paper to put out, you know."
Jack was a lot less depressed once he knew that Darla's reasons for going home had nothing to do with him. "Understood," he said in an upbeat tone of voice. "So, how about this: Tomorrow morning Mac and I will come to your office as soon as we're decent and take you out to . . . brunch(?)—if you can get away for an hour or two. When we get back, we can look over the dictation in your office."
"Now hold on a minute, Jack," I objected. "This finding Dad thing is supposed to be just you and me . . . isn't it? I mean, from my understanding of what Uncle George said, if Darla had another copy of the so-called 'evidence,' she was supposed to give it to you and then turn us loose to sort it out."
"Not necessarily," my brother said. "When Uncle George sent me to Darla, it was in the hope—his and Dad's—that she and I would hit it off. What would be the point in bringing Darla and me together if you and I just took the evidence and locked ourselves away somewhere with it? . . . No, I think Dad intended Darla to work with us on this thing—at least as much as her job at the paper will allow . . . especially since she has no more idea where Dad is than we do."
"I agree," said Darla, "which is why Jack's idea to work on it in my office is a good one. I can be onsite to do my job, and help you guys at the same time."
"And when am I supposed to see Jamie?"
My dinner date smiled at me mockingly, with one arm lying atop the other as she leaned on the edge of the table. "I'm still here, Mac, and I'd appreciate it if you'd consult with me before attempting to make plans of any kind that might involve me."
My mouth almost dropped open; but, in my line of work, I've had to become a master in the art of the quick recovery. "I'm sorry if I made an incorrect assumption, Jamie. It's just that I've really enjoyed your company this evening, and I kind of had the feeling you might feel the same way . . ."
"I do," she said. Then, shaking her head, she continued, "But that's not the point."
"I realize that now. Again, I apologize. So then, would you like to go out with me again sometime?" At this point, I was not at all sure what kind of response to expect.
"Yes, I would," Jamie said (causing me to think "Phew!" and to mentally wipe my forehead with relief). "Trouble is, I'm really swamped at work right now: sometimes I stay late, and sometimes I'm just plain exhausted at the end of a long day. I came on this double date tonight more as a favor to Aunt Darla than anything else. . . About the only time I'm able to go out is on the weekends—Saturday or Sunday. A handful of projects at the lab are on watch 24/7 and the people who work on those have rotating shifts; so, the rest of us usually get weekends off. But, other than that, I'm pretty much unavailable."
"You don't break for lunch?" I asked matter-of-factly.
"Of course I break for lunch," she replied, blushing slightly. "But I usually don't go anywhere. I bring lunch from home and eat at my station."
Darla was shaking her head in disbelief. "I told Jack you didn't date much because most men are intimidated by your intelligence. I can see now that I was only partly right. . . Sweetie, didn't anyone ever tell you that all work and no play makes Jamie a dull girl? You need to cut loose once in a while! Have some fun now and then. It's not as if the world is going to end tomorrow."
"Some of the people I work with think it will," was Jamie's reply.
Darla shook her head. "I'd venture to estimate that—despite the steadily declining morals of the general populace and the tenuous political condition of the world as a whole—we have at least another twenty years before either God or the politicians blow us all to kingdom come. Regardless of what the pessimists might say, no one is in that much of a hurry to die."
"Except for those terrorists who believe they'll spend eternity in Heaven with a multitude of virgins and sumptuous feasts," Jack commented.
"Let's not get into that right now, please," said Darla to my brother. Turning to Jamie, she said, "Enjoy life while you can, kid. Don't let it pass you by while you spend all your time in a laboratory trying to save the world from itself."
Jamie nodded at her aunt and sighed. "I know. You're right." Pausing momentarily, she then looked across the table at me and said, "All right, Mac. Come to my lab day after tomorrow and we'll have lunch together."
I was about to ask "Why the day after tomorrow," but then I remembered that Jack and I were going to be having brunch with Darla in the morning. "Day after tomorrow it is," I finally said. "So, could you give me the address of this place, and maybe some instructions on how to get there?"
Jamie nodded, took a business card out of her purse and drew a small map on the back of it. She then handed it to me and I looked it over. "Clear enough," I said, nodding. "I think I can find my way there without much difficulty."
"There's a coffee shop right across the street. It's next door to a hotel that's used by a lot of our clients (and other people who come to that part of town on business). We can probably get a decent meal there, if you're interested."
"Why not? I'm not particularly picky." I looked at Darla, smiled roguishly and winked.
Jack said, "If you two are through planning your social life . . . ." He snapped his fingers as the server passed by and he managed to get her attention.
She came over, harried and in a hurry. "Do you guys need something else?"
"Just the check," Jack stated.
She wrote out the total and set it—face-down—on the table in front of Jack. "What's the damage?" I asked. He showed me. "Not bad. I can handle a fifteen percent tip on that."
"Good. You take care of that while I go to the register and pay this thing." Darla went with Jack while Jamie stayed behind with me.
"So, what do you think?" I asked as I stood up and reached into my pocket for my wallet. "About the two of them, I mean."
"I'm not sure; they seem to really care about each other, but Aunt Darla's still pretty vulnerable. I'd like to see them get together, but I think it could take longer than Jack might be expecting it to."
"Why?" I queried, frowning.
"Aunt Darla and Uncle Frank were happily married. So, even if she still has feelings for Jack, when it comes down to brass tacks, she may find she's not ready for another serious relationship yet."
I nodded. "Maybe. But if what I saw and heard tonight is any indication, Jack's ready. He genuinely loves Darla. I have no doubt that he'll wait however long it takes for her to come around. If he had to, I think he'd even resign his commission so he'd be available to spend more time with her."
"I don't know Jack well enough to agree or disagree with that statement," Jamie said. "Knowing Aunt Darla, though, if Jack did resign his commission for her, she'd feel guilty. He'd have to give her a better reason than that, or she wouldn't let him do it."
"You're undoubtedly right," I agreed. "We'll have to wait and see what the future brings. Oh! Jack's waving at us; time to go." Jamie nodded, slid her arm through mine, and we headed for the door.
As I opened the back door of the Jeep one more time for Jamie, I couldn't help wondering why in the world I did want to go out with her again. Yeah, she was pretty . . . and she was as intelligent as Jack had said. But she was also very driven. I suppose most scientists are. It was what she was working on that puzzled me so much.
On the way to the restaurant, she'd told me she was trying to come up with a way to create a stable artificial wormhole that could be used to sort of bend space, so that traveling from one solar system—or even from one galaxy—to another would take a lot less time.
Scientists have been working for several years on things that sci-fi authors had been writing about for decades: stasis fields, warp speed, hyper-drives, and cryogenic sleep (or suspended animation). Those were the tools sci-fi writers used to get humans from Earth to other planets. Voyages like that would take years, and the stasis fields or cryogenic chambers would slow down the aging process. Thus far, though, the scientists involved in those projects had met with little to no success. Jamie, therefore, was working on an alternate solution. A worthy and noble undertaking, to be sure. . . But a stable artificial wormhole? That, too, sounded like science fiction.
Still, I couldn't help being fascinated by the idea. What if she managed to do it? I didn't really think there was much chance of it, but . . . it was fun to listen to her expound on it. I guess that's the reason I wanted to go out with her again. As driven as she was, her radical theories made for pretty interesting conversation . . . and she was willing to listen to me spout off about animal rights, pollution, rain forests, eco-terrorism and all the rest of it.
One of the things my undercover work had done for me on a personal level was to make me more aware of what's really going on in the world—things most people don't spend much time thinking about, even though groups like those I "joined" were attempting to raise public awareness, primarily in hopes of getting more support for their causes. Fact is, I had actually made contributions to each and every one of them. Even though it'd started out as being a part of my cover—to convince the folks in charge that I was on the level—I continued doing it, long after my sincerity stopped being in question.
Yeah, the world is in chaos. My solution is for us lowly humans to clean it up as best as we can. Jamie's is to prepare for the worst, i.e., humanity ultimately destroying itself. I wondered if I could ever make a convert out of her—or maybe "optimist" is a better word. I have no doubt that the world's going to come to an end someday . . . not that I'm overly religious or anything. But, judging from what's been happening in recent decades, I tend to believe what it says in the Bible: when God gets completely fed up, He's gonna call a halt to the whole mess; He's not gonna wait around for us to do it to ourselves. Therefore, my feelings on the matter are that the more we try to help make things better, the more time we can buy for ourselves and our poor, abused planet. If I could get Jamie to see things from that point of view, maybe I could get her working on something more productive . . . like increased crop yields, weather control devices, or more cost-efficient ways of cleaning up pollution. . . Of course, those things aren't really in her field. . . I'd have to give it a little more thought. . ..
