AftershocksEpilogue: Sketchbook~ line ~“
Willis!”
Pete Thornton almost never needed to raise his voice. There was a particular tone of voice he used when a transgression was serious; anyone who had worked with him for any length of time knew it. If they were lucky, they knew it because they’d heard it used on someone else.
Willis was hearing it now. He’d been caught red-handed at the fax machine. He tried to hide the document behind his back.
“Willis, you
know the policy.”
“Pete, c’mon. You can’t call that a policy!”
“The hell I can’t. Where were you sending it?”
“The Western Research Division labs.”
Pete held out a peremptory hand for the sheet of paper. “You
know the new installments of ‘Commando Pete’ go to Helen and myself first, before
anyone else gets them.”
Willis sighed melodramatically as MacGyver came through the doorway and nearly walked into them.
“Hey, did Steffie do another episode?” Mac whisked the sheet of paper away before anyone could stop him. “Cool. Is Willis in this one?”
“No,” Willis snapped. “Just as well.”
“Aw, don’t be like that. Willis the Wizard is a
great character. I loved it that time when you hit the computer with your hat – ”
“Mac, I hate the hat.”
“C’mon. The big wizard hat’s just part of it. Anyway, when you hit the computer and it falls over whimpering and starts to tell you all its secrets . . .
great stuff!”
“Yeah, but you’re the one who actually gets to save the whales. You ought to try that for real some day.”
“Tangling their harpoons with red tape? It’s tempting.” Mac scanned the page, and his face fell. “Aw, nuts.”
Willis smirked at him in turn. “What’s the matter? You don’t like what she’s done with Mac the Mighty?”
MacGyver made a face, and Pete finally succeeded in retrieving the page and reading it himself. He smiled broadly. “So you lose all your powers if you put on a necktie? I’ll have to remember that.”
~ form ~In the art lab, Addie, Veronica and Gordie were hard at work, shuttling paintings in and out of the vault as the photographer worked away, recording every item in the collection. After an early altercation with Ruth, he had stopped complaining about the poor quality of the shots he was getting of the paintings that hadn’t yet been cleaned and restored. He hadn’t liked Ruth’s offer to shut him up in an underground tunnel for forty years and see how he looked at the end of it – there was a gleam in her eye that made him wonder if she was joking or not.
Laura was standing, arms crossed, gradually wilting under Ruth’s loquacity.
“The academic process is all very well, and I trust you to make an watertight job of it. But it’s high time we let the rest of the art world in on the fun – especially since publication now will put the collection firmly in the spotlight of history. The next band of acquisitive thugs won’t have the presumed safety net of insufficient documentation.” Ruth patted her hand. “And you needn’t worry about Phoenix’ reputation, my dear. If we’re accused of jumping the gun on publication in an egomaniacal search for unsubstantiated glory, well, we can take the lumps. You shall have the joy of blazing our trail into art history. And you can take as long as you need. Be thorough. There’s no hurry.”
“What about the funding for the project?”
“No fears there. Joseph Goldman has flung himself behind us, heart, soul, and wallet. And Douglas Carmichael was so delighted at Stephanie’s coup with Erich Hartmann that he hasn’t simply renewed his annual gifting pledge; he’s increased it.”
Laura glanced over at where Rafé and Stephanie were sitting, well out of the way of the scurry of activity. “How are they taking it?”
~ composition ~Rafé and Stephanie were sitting with their hands clasped tightly under the table. Stephanie was wearing a t-shirt reproduction of Munch’s ‘The Scream’, and felt like it.
“I could turn it down . . . “ she began miserably.
“Don’ you
dare,” Rafé replied fiercely. “You an’ me, we’ll deal. But you ain’t gonna walk away from an opportunity like this jus’ cause a’ me, you hear?”
“But – ”
“You think I could live with myself if you did that? No way. Opportunity ain’t nothin’ to blow off.” He squeezed her hand. “Don’ you go off the deep end on me. I need you, baby. I got all them scholarship applications I gotta fill out. Else Ruth gonna have my ass, and MacGyver gonna chew up anything she leave behind.” Rafé leaned over and nuzzled Stephanie’s neck, murmuring into her ear, “It’s okay, baby. Come clean. It’s excitin’, ain’t it? You gonna be makin’ a real difference. Don’ you think that matters to me?”
Stephanie turned back to him, tears spangling her cheeks, and threw her arms around him. “Why can’t you come too?”
“ ‘Cause I don’ speak German. But tha’s okay. If what we got is real, it ain’t gonna go away jus’ cause you got a job an’ I got to get ready to go to college.” Rafé eyes lit up, and Stephanie basked in the glow. “
College, man! Can you believe it? The closest anyone in my family ever got to college was when my uncle got hired as janitor at the community college.”
Stephanie buried her head in his shoulder. “Rafé, is it all right that it’s exciting? Really, really amazing? I’ll miss you, you know, and Addie . . . but . . . ”
“But you gonna be back in the fall for college yourself, an’ you gonna tell us all about it.” Rafé grinned. “You gonna have to check out the music scene while you in Germany hangin’ with all them art eggheads, or Addie gonna take back all her clothes you borrowed.”
Stephanie giggled. “Hopefully by then, I’ll have stuff of my own that doesn’t make me look like the Preppy Queen of Puritania.”
~ perspective ~By the time MacGyver and Pete reached the lab, Ruth had worn Laura down to a compliant nub. Even Gordie seemed subdued, and the photographer was keeping a low profile. Pete studied Ruth with a worried frown.
“You sure you’re going to be all right?”
“Relax, Pete. We’ll be fine.”
“Well, call me if there’s anything I can do? Hell, call me even if there
isn’t anything I can do.”
Ruth gave him a long-suffering look. “Really, Pete, I’d have thought you’d be glad to see the last of me.”
Pete shook his head at her and embraced her.
Laura followed suit. “You’re going home?”
“We’re headed back to the Bay Area tonight, at last. And I am going to steal Addie for a few days, if she can bear to be parted from her new light o’ love.”
MacGyver raised an eyebrow. Laura smiled. “It seems Officer Wyatt has a younger brother who’s a studio musician. He’s also got a sister who does publicity for one of the studios, and a cousin who’s a jazz musician, and another cousin who’s a producer.” She tallied them on her fingers. “Between them, they can score any number of backstage passes to all kinds of obscure little shows, or sneak her into recording sessions. She’s even started talking about doing designs for album covers. Sorry, MacGyver, I’m afraid you’ve been replaced.”
Mac’s face lost the trace of a hunted expression that had haunted him every time he dropped in at the art lab.
Pete turned to Ruth. “I hear they’ve decided to send Dieter von Schüssel back to Germany for trial.”
Ruth nodded. “Attempted murder would have been a bit tricky to pull off in the US courts – and I confess to feeling a certain satisfaction. I gather he’s spent years dreading the spectre of Germany’s post-war wrath, and I for one relish the notion that he’ll end up facing it after all.”
Mac broke in. “And you still don’t remember him?”
“Not at all; he’s a complete blank. As I told you, it’s people I remember, not faces or names. I seem to have been a victim of my own inflated reputation. Not to mention that man’s inflated ego.”
Pete crooked a sardonic smile. “And he was so convinced that he’d made an indelible impression on you.”
“Well, he did on Henry. But Henry was the one who could always remember names. They did meet, you know, in Berlin, just after the war – he was Dieter Schulmeister then. He’d been with the ERR in France and Italy, so he
had been through my stomping grounds – I dare say I did meet him, at some point. But I’m damned if I can remember him.”
“Do you think he’d have gone after Henry next?” Pete asked bluntly.
Ruth’s face hardened. “Very likely.”
Mac felt his skin prickle.
Just as well Dieter’s headed for Germany . . . he’ll be out of Ruth’s reach, anyway. Probably.Ruth had turned to him, her smile no longer shrouded with old shadows. “MacGyver, before I forget – I have a present for you. Two presents, in fact.”
Mac looked at her warily. “No ties, I hope?”
She raised her cane and buffeted him lightly on the arm. “Not after you took such poor care of the last one!” She handed him a slim volume, bound in gold-stamped leather. “It’s Weisenthal’s
The Sunflower. You’ve never read it, have you?”
“No. You said it’s about forgiveness, right?”
“Not exactly.” Ruth drew a deep breath. “It’s really about the limitations of forgiveness. You’ll see when you read it – the whole point is that Weisenthal
wasn’t able to forgive, when he was asked to do so – asked under appalling circumstances. After all, some things are unforgivable. Or ought to be. I’ve never aspired to sainthood myself.”
“Me neither.” Mac eyed her. “So what’s the other present?”
“Something I should have done long since, I dare say . . . that inner-city organisation of yours – ”
“You mean the Challengers Club?”
“That’s the one. I gather their funding is somewhat haphazard – well, I hope you don’t mind, but I’m putting out a few feelers on your behalf, down here in the LA area. With a bit of luck, we should be able to pull together an endowment fund for them – mind you, it won’t do much more than help pay the rent and keep the lights on, but at the very least it ought to make the load a trifle easier to carry –
ouff!” Ruth’s running commentary was lost in a squashed exclamation as Mac picked her up bodily in an enthusiastic hug.
~ colour ~Laura didn’t actually own a lot of stuff. Even with everything unpacked – ‘everything’ turned out to be mostly books, plus clothes and art supplies – and all the books loaded onto newly purchased bookcases, there was plenty of space left in the now reasonably tidy apartment to set up one corner of the living room as an art studio.
Mac was biting his tongue in his concentration. He was working on a gouache landscape; Laura was working on her diplomacy.
It had actually been a genuine relief to discover that there was something the über-competent MacGyver wasn’t good at. His drawing skill was rudimentary at best – he had admitted that he’d never needed to do any sketching beyond engineering doodles and rough maps. As for painting – his sense of colour was just about what she should have expected, after seeing some of his more garish shirts. But it had come as a surprise anyway.
“So . . . ” Mac glanced sideways at her, trying to keep his voice casual. “It’s been a few days. You had any more nightmares about guys with guns?”
To his delight, he was rewarded with an unshadowed smile. “My therapist taught me a new trick – have you ever heard of active dream transformation?”
“No, but I get the idea.”
“Well, he said that I needed to find an image of my own inner power, and use that directly against the dream image the next time it appeared.”
“And . . . ?”
“The second night after you’d left, I was half asleep and started to have the dream – and when the gunman got within range – I hit him over the head with a copy of my thesis.”
Mac blinked. “Whoa. Remind me not to get you angry.”
“I don’t think you’ve got much to worry about,” Laura laughed.
As Mac turned back to his painting, she studied his work, looking for something she could praise without hypocrisy. He was working on a mountain scene – sweeping forested slopes under a cloud-mottled sky. The technique was clumsy and amateurish, but it was heartfelt. She watched him pick up a finer brush and add in a soaring bird with a few careful strokes.
“That’s good. You’re improving – you’re really putting your heart into it.” That would work – it was honest, and the vagueness wasn’t too obvious.
She was rewarded with a smile as heartfelt as the painting, and far more glorious.
“Really? You’re not just sayin’ that?”
“I did tell you this wasn’t my strong suit – if you really want to learn to paint, you should go take some classes.”
Laura never tired of watching MacGyver’s face – the mobile features, the expressive eyebrows; and when she caught him in a thoughtful mood, the dark velvet eyes seemed to go on forever. Watching that face shut down so suddenly was a wrench.
“Actually, I did take a painting class for a while . . . it was a couple of years ago.” Mac looked down at his brush, feeling her eyes on him. He twiddled it in his hand, wishing he’d evaded the subject. Too late now. “I kinda stopped going after one of the other students tried to kill me.”
Laura blanched and her lips tightened. Mac wondered if it was for his sake or her own – another demon added to the legions she’d already faced.
“Was it personal?” she asked softly.
“It was for me.”
Laura watched the walls go up, and her heart sank. She bit her lip and looked at the painting Mac had been working on. He was poking at one of the trees with the brush, clumsily stippling the leaves with the wrong shade of green, not really seeing the colours in front of him. She took a deep breath. “I don’t know what kind of class it was, but trust me, Mac. Your painting isn’t
that bad.”
Mac’s head snapped up to look at her, and incredibly, in a moment, the wall melted. He gave her a shaky smile, blinking a few times, fighting not to look away. Laura walked over, plucked the paintbrush from his hand and tossed it aside, and reached up and cupped his face, drawing his mouth down to hers. She felt a dampness on her cheeks, but wasn’t sure whether it was her own tears or not.
The brushes were left to stiffen and dry next to the forgotten painting. In the morning, Laura would have to decide whether to throw them out or try to salvage them for Mac’s next painting lesson.
~ light ~Afterwards, Mac fell into a dreamless sleep, his face calm and relaxed, one arm crooked around Laura; he didn’t stir when she roused herself some time later. She lay for a while, running a slow, grateful hand over the warm planes of his body, stroking the sandy waves of his hair. At last, she carefully sat up and reached for the sketchpad that she’d been keeping beside the bed.
MacGyver’s eyes flickered open, dreamily looking at her from under long lashes. It was some time before his drowsy brain identified the scratching sounds.
He sat up, blinking, shaking the long hair out of his eyes. She had quickly hidden the tablet, but he looked at her suspiciously. “You were sketchin’ me while I was sleeping, weren’t you? Again?”
“It’s the only time you stay still for long enough!”
Mac rolled onto his back and threw an arm over his face. “Aw,
man . . . ” He could feel himself reddening, and when he realised it must show over more than just his face, he felt himself blush even harder.
Laura tossed the pencil aside, and reached out to him again.
This time, there was no drowsiness afterwards, only a comfortable glow that led easily into meandering conversation.
“I missed you. Did your romp through the mountains go well? What was it for again?”
“Earthquake studies. Pete signed me up for it – it’s a whole series. I’ve been doin’ them on and off for months now.”
Laura gave him a wicked grin. “So. Did the earth move for you?”
Mac gave her a long, meaningful look. “You bet.”
The phone had rung, some time in the last . . . hour? Laura had ignored it and MacGyver had been glad to follow her lead. Now, she finally rolled out of bed, located her robe on its hook on the back of the door, and walked out into the living room. Mac heard the electronic squawk as she checked the answering machine.
When she reappeared in the bedroom doorway, her shoulders were slumped. Mac sat up in worried alarm. “Has something happened . . .?”
She shrugged and leaned heavily against the doorframe. “No, no, nothing’s actually happened. Mac, would you relax? Please? No-one’s been attacked or kidnapped or carried off by desperadoes or anything.” She drew a deep breath.
MacGyver frowned. “Okay, so nobody needs rescuing right now. What’s wrong? You look, well . . . ”
“It’s
nothing!” She bit her lip. “It’s just – they’ve changed my schedule, and they waited till now to tell me. I have to leave tomorrow for Germany. I’ll be gone – oh, hell, I have no idea – if things go well, it could be weeks.” She looked at Mac as if expecting an explosion.
Instead, when she met his eyes, she saw a sheepish expression where she had expected resentment or anger. Mac quirked his mouth.
“Um . . . I – Laura, I’ve been kinda puttin’ off telling you – I have to leave tomorrow too. The next phase of the earthquake project . . . ” He held up a hand as if he thought she needed placating. “I was gonna tell you! I just – I didn’t want to ruin things.”
Laura frowned in puzzlement. “You only just got back in town. Don’t they ever let you catch your breath?”
MacGyver shrugged. “I thought I’d have a few more days, but they moved my schedule up.” He looked at Laura almost peevishly. “What the heck are you grinning at?”
It was Laura’s turn to look sheepish. “Mac, the last guy I dated – well, maybe ‘dating’ isn’t quite the right term – at any rate, we split up because he got mad about my schedule. I was traveling a lot of the time, and I’d see him between trips. The funny thing was, when we first got involved, he swore that was what he wanted – but after a while, he started getting angry because he said I wasn’t ‘making time’ for him.” She shrugged away from the doorframe, stuffing her hands in the pockets of her robe. “I got really angry at him for changing his tune like that – we never really got back on track afterwards. He just didn’t understand.” She lifted an eyebrow. “So which godforsaken corner of the world are they sending you to this time?”
“Iceland first – they’ve been involved with the earthquake project from the beginning – then Italy. Down south, near Naples – where the big quake was a few years back.”
“You’re kidding.” Laura’s eyes were dancing.
“Why should I? What’s up?”
“Well, I’m headed for Germany first – I have to meet with some museum directors, and turn Stephanie over to my counterpart in Berlin. I only hope we don’t end up with an international incident provoked by naïve caricaturing. After that . . . ” Laura glided back towards the bed. “After that, I’m headed for Naples. Then Israel, but not for a few weeks; I’m going to be meeting with the Italian Minister of Culture. Their art recovery project has really fallen apart in the last few years – they used to be the best in Europe – and we might be able to light a fire under them. How long are you going to be chasing Italian earthquakes?”
“Three weeks at least.”
“Think they might be able to spare you for a few days in all that? You’ll be practically in the cradle of the Renaissance – surely you can take a little time off for some art appreciation?”
MacGyver’s response was a smile that lit up the room. He reached out and caught at the sash of her robe, tugging at it gently. The loose knot fell apart, and he held on to the ends of the sash and drew her towards him, sliding his hands underneath the fabric once she was within reach. “Oh, trust me. I appreciate it.”
~ fin ~
