False Memory

asked.
    “I don’t have one,” Dusty said.
    “Should.”
    “Don’t.”
    Fig reattached the body of the truck to the base, taped the little screwdriver to the underside, and handed it to Dusty. “Let ‘em scan.”
    “Lay it on its side in a suitcase, and it makes a recognizable toytruck silhouette on an X ray,” Martie said admiringly.
    “There you go,” Fig said.
    “They wouldn’t make anyone open a bag to inspect anything like that.”
    “Nope.”
    “We could probably even take this in a carry-on,” Dusty said.
    “Better.”
    “Better?” Martie said. “Well, yeah, because sometimes airlines lose the luggage you don’t carry.”
    Fig nodded. “Exactly.”
    “You ever use this yourself?” Skeet asked.
    “Never,” said Fig.
    “Then why do you have it?”
    “Just in case.”
    Turning the fire truck over in his hands, Dusty said, “You’re a strange man, Foster Newton.”
    “Thanks,” said Fig. “Kevlar body armor?”
    “Huh?”
    “Kevlar. Bulletproof.”
    “Bulletproof vests?” Dusty said.
    “Got ‘em?”
    “No.”
    “Want ‘em?”
    “You have body armor?” Martie marveled.
    “Sure.”
    Skeet said, “You ever needed it, Fig?”
    “Not yet,” said Fig.
    Martie shook her head. “Next you’ll be offering us an alien death-ray pistol.”
    “Don’t have one,” Fig said with evident disappointment.
    “We’ll skip the body armor,” Dusty said. “They might notice how bulked up we look going through airport security.”
    “Might,” Fig agreed, taking him seriously.
     
     
    The doctor found nothing more to engage him downstairs. Though he had a lively interest in the arts and interior design, he didn’t pause to admire even one painting, article of furniture, or objet d’art. The decor left him cold.
    In the bedroom were signs of a hasty departure. Two dresser drawers weren’t closed. A closet door stood open. A sweater lay discarded on the floor.
    On a closer inspection of the closet, he saw two matched pieces of luggage stored overhead on a shelf. Beside those two was an empty space where two smaller bags might have been shelved.
    Another bedroom and bath provided no clues, and then he came to Martie’s office.
    Busy blue-eyed girl. Busy making Hobbit games. Death waits in Mordor.
    Across her large U-shaped work area were stacked books, maps of fantasy lands, sketches of characters, and other materials related to her project based on The Lord of the Rings. Ahriman took more time examining these items than was warranted, indulging his enthusiasm for anything to do with games.
    As he pored through the computer-assisted designs for Hobbits and Orcs and other creatures, the doctor realized one reason why he was able to compose routinely better haiku about Martie than he’d been able to write when Susan and other women were his inspiration. He and Martie shared this gaming interest. She liked the power of being the game master, as did he. At least this one aspect of her mind resonated in sympathy with his.
    He wondered if, in time, he might discover other attitudes and passions they shared. Once they were past the current regrettable ferment in their relationship, how ironic it would be to learn that they were fated to have a more complex future together than he had ever envisioned, distracted as he had been by Susan’s exceptional beauty and by Martie’s family connections.
    The sweet sentimentalist in Ahriman delighted at the thought of falling in love or at least in something like it. Although his life was full and his habits long established, he would not be averse to the complication of romance.
    Proceeding from desktop to desk drawers, he felt now less like a detective than like a naughty lover leafing through his darling’s diary in search of the most guarded secrets of her heart.
    In a bank of three drawers, he found nothing to interest either a detective or a lover. In the wide but shallow center drawer, however, among rulers and pencils and erasers and the like, he came upon a microcassette on which SUSAN had been printed in red letters.
    He felt what a gifted Gypsy might feel when tipping a mess of tea leaves on a plate and glimpsing a particularly ominous fate in the soggy patterns: a chill that turned the pia mater of his spine into a membrane of ice.
    He searched the remaining drawers for a tape recorder that would accept the microcassette. Martie didn’t have one.
    When he saw the answering machine on one corner of the desk, he realized what he held in his hand.
     
     
    The aluminum awning, vibrating in the wind, had the guttural growl