Cities in Flight

“Call it belated common sense.” She sat down against an ancient railing and looked up at the blurred stars. “No, don’t, that’s not what it is. I love him. John, for all his neglects and his emptiness. I’d forgotten that for a while, but it’s so. I’m sorry, but it’s so.”

“I wish you were a little sorrier.”

“Oh? Why?”

“So you’d believe what you’re saying,” Amalfi said harshly. “Face it, Dee. It was a great romantic decision until you realized that Web would be going with me. You’re still looking for surrogates. You didn’t make it with me. You won’t make it with Web either.”

“What a bastardly thing to say. Let’s go; I’ve heard enough.”

“Deny it, then.”

“I deny it, damn you.”

“You’ll withdraw your objections to Web’s going with me on He?”

“That has nothing to do with it. It’s a filthy accusation and I won’t listen to another word about it.”

Amalfi was silent. The moonlight streamed down on Father Duffy’s face, toneless and enigmatic. Nobody, not even the City Fathers, knew who Father Duffy had been. There was an old splash of blood on his left foot, but nobody knew how that had gotten there, either; it had been left there just in case it was historic.

“Let’s go.”

“No. It’s early yet; they won’t be there for another hour. Why do you want Web to stay on New Earth? If I’m wrong, then tell me what’s right.”

“It’s none of your damned business, and I’m tired of this whole subject.”

“It’s wholly my business. I need Estelle. If Web stays here, she stays here.”

“You,” Dee said in a voice of bitter, dawning triumph, “are in love with Estelle! Why, you self-righteous—”

“Mind your tongue. I am in love with Estelle—and I’ll lay no more finger on her than I ever laid on you. I’ve loved many more women than you ever managed to maneuver into your voyeur’s household, most of them before you were even born; I know the difference between love and possession—I learned it the hard way, whereas I can’t see that you ever learned it at all. You are going to learn it tonight that I promise you.”

“Are you threatening me, John?”

“You’re damned well right I am.”

At Tudor Tower Place, bridging 42nd Street at First Avenue, looking toward the bare plaza where the UN Building had fallen in a shower of blood and glass a thousand years ago:

“I love you.”

“I love you.”

“I will go wherever you go.”

“I will go wherever you go.”

“No matter what the City Fathers say?”

“No matter what the City Fathers say.”

“Then that’s all we need.”

“Yes. That’s all we need.”

In the control tower:

“They’re late,” Hazleton said, a little fretfully. “Oh, well, it’s an easy town to get lost in.”

Duffy Square:

“You wouldn’t like it if I changed my mind and came with you.”

“I don’t want you. I’m interested only in the kids.”

“You can’t call my bluff. As of now, I’m going along.”

“And so are the kids?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Because I think they’d be better off not on the same planet with—either of us.”

“That’s a fair start. But it’s only a start. I don’t care whether you go or stay, but I will have Web and Estelle.”

“I thought you would. But you can’t have them without me.”

“And Mark?”

“If he wants to go.”

“He doesn’t, and you know it.”

“How can you be so sure? You could be just wishing.”

Amalfi laughed. Dee balled her left fist and hit him furiously on the bridge of the nose.

Tudor Tower Place:

“It’s time to go.”

“No. No.”

“Yes, it is.”

“Not yet. Not quite yet.”

“ …. All right. Not quite yet.”

“Are you sure? Are you really sure?”

“Yes I am, oh yes I am.”

“No matter what the …”

“No matter what they say. I’m sure.”

The control tower:

“There you are,” Hazleton said. “What happened, did you have an accident? You looked mussed to the eyebrows.”

“You must have run into a doorknob, John,” Jake added. He stuttered out his parrot’s chuckle. “Well, you came to the right town for it. I don’t know where else in the universe you could find a doorknob.”

“Where are the children?” Dee said, in a voice as dangerously even as the surface of 12-gauge armor plate.

“Not here yet,” Hazleton said. “Give them time—they’re afraid the City Fathers may separate them, so naturally they’re staying together until the last minute. What did you fall into, anyhow, Dee? Was it serious?”

“No.” Her face shut down. Bewildered, Hazleton looked from her to Amalfi and back again. It seemed as though the mouse over Amalfi’s eyes, which was growing rapidly, puzzled him much less than Dee’s grim and non-specific disarray.

“I hear the children,” Gifford Bonner said. “They’re whispering at the bottom of the lift shaft. John, are you sure this was wise? I begin to misdoubt it. Suppose the City Fathers say no? That would be an injustice; they love each other—why should we put their last three years to a machine test?”

“Abide it, Gif,” Amalfi said. “It’s too late to do otherwise; and the outcome isn’t as foreclosed as you think.”

“I hope you’re right.”

“I hope so too. I make no predictions—the City Fathers surprised me often enough before. But the kids agreed to the test. Beyond that, let’s just wait.”