“Everyone in this town is anxious to protect Martin,” I said. “I couldn’t understand it—the librarians, the newspaper—he’d clearly been in Tinney. He’s a stranger, but he has the town behind him. You have the forceful character it would take to line up the rest of Tinney. Were you their mayor?”
Dorothy narrowed her eyes at me. “You can say you’re terribly worried, but who’s to say what you’re worried about?”
“Martin’s grandmother was murdered last week,” I said. “The killers shot Martin’s mother, but she survived. Martin’s great-uncle, Julius Dzornen, died two nights ago in a car crash because someone tampered with his brakes. I’m worried that the men who killed all these people have Martin in their sights.”
Meg gasped. Dorothy’s mouth worked as she tried to decide what to say.
When she didn’t speak after a long moment, I tried not to sigh audibly, but recited the history of Kitty, Judy, the papers Martin and Judy had fought over, and the BREENIAC sketch.
“When Martin was arguing with his mother about these old papers, what excited him most was seeing a letter from Ada Byron.”
I looked at Alison, who accepted her cue to explain why Ada Byron’s name would be a red flag to anyone who knew the history of computers.
When she’d finished, I picked up the story again. “Martin knew who the original Ada Byron was, so he guessed, as we did, that it was a fake identity. I’d bet just about anything that Martin found Byron’s obituary and that he came here, to Ms. Byron’s house, to ask you the same thing we did: Did she leave any other papers behind?”
Dorothy pursed her lips. “Maybe he did, maybe he didn’t. Why should I trust you with any information?”
I looked up at her. “A number of people care about what became of Martin and the documents. Homeland Security wants any nuclear secrets Martin may have. They’re tracking an old Nazi rocket scientist who used to thumb her nose at the FBI, and they think Martin has secret documents she made off with. The head of Metargon thinks Martin is selling his top-secret code to the Chinese or the Iranians.”
Next to me, Alison gave an involuntary cry. This wasn’t news to her, just hard to hear in public.
“Ms. Breen and I slipped out of Chicago undetected, at least, I think we did, but I don’t know how much time we have before they find the same trail we followed. Goons working for the head of Metargon knocked me out yesterday; they stole a printout of Byron’s obituary from my jeans pocket. We may have company before the afternoon is over.”
Dorothy looked at the house, as if wondering how little Lily could be protected. My own eyes widened as I followed her gaze—not to the inside of the house, but the frame around the screen door. Inside the carved decorations, I saw tiny camera eyes, identical to those Martin had mounted in the doorway guarding his basement hideaway in Skokie. In the middle of a bunch of grapes was the same minute speaker.
I got to my feet. “Ms. Ferguson, if Martin isn’t here now, he’s been here, and spent a considerable amount of time here.”
“Martin’s here?” Alison cried.
She came up the stairs behind me as I opened the screen door. Meg tried to stop her. I moved fast, ducked my head, used my shoulder to hit Meg in the diaphragm. She cried out and her hold on the shotgun slackened. I took it from her.
Alison ran past us into the front room. “Martin! Martin! It’s Alison! Where are you?”
Little Lily had been watching television, but she turned to stare at the live drama in the doorway, a finger in her mouth. Meg rubbed her abdomen, her face pinched more in anger than pain: I’d embarrassed her in front of her family.
Dorothy followed us into the house, weariness in the lines of her face. The three of us stood in the entryway, listening to Alison calling Martin’s name from the back of the house.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I really need to find him before Cordell Breen’s goons do. Will you take me to him?”
“Who is the girl, really?” Dorothy asked.
“Her father owns Metargon, but she’s on Martin’s side. At least, I hope she is.”
“I guess if you’re going to break in, show us up for not being strong enough to defend ourselves, I’ll have to let you see the house,” Dorothy said bitterly.
Meg scowled at her, but didn’t speak, just went into the living room to sit next to her little girl on the floor. Dorothy took me on through, showing me the dining room, the kitchen, the two small bedrooms beyond it, as if she were a realtor and I a prospective tenant. The kitchen held a computer monitor connected to the cameras embedded in the front door. I watched a school bus trundle past the house, heading north toward the open prairie.