Reamde

“Is small price,” Sokolov said. “Is very small price.” The workings of the video chat linkup made it difficult for them to know who he was looking at, but Zula got the sense that the look, and the words, were intended for her.

“We all had some things to pay for,” Zula said, “and we paid in different ways, and it wasn’t always fair.”

“You had nothing to pay for,” Sokolov said.

“Oh,” Zula said, “I think I did.”

The silence that followed was more than a little uncomfortable, and after giving it a respectful observance, Olivia edged around into view, standing behind Sokolov, and said, “Speaking of which, what do we hear from Marlon?”

“We’re going to Skype him later,” Csongor said. “It is early in the morning, yet, in Beijing.”

“He doesn’t work all night anymore?” Olivia said wonderingly.

“Nolan has him on banker’s hours,” Richard said. “Oh, he was up as recently as a few hours ago, playing T’Rain, but we’re going to let him catch a little shut-eye before we confront him with this.” And he made a gesture down the length of the couch.

“I think it’s a very nice lineup to be confronted with,” Olivia said, “and I’m sorry H. M. government doesn’t observe Thanksgiving, or I’d be there.” She glanced down. “We’d be there.”

“Immigration,” Sokolov said darkly.

“We’ll get that sorted,” Olivia assured him.

Gunshots were heard from outside. It was difficult to know how the sounds came through the Skype link, but the expression on Sokolov’s face changed markedly.

“It’s nothing!” Zula exclaimed. “Here, I’ll show you!” She got up, picked up the laptop, carried it as close to the window as its cables would allow, and aimed it out in the direction of the crick.

To Richard, in truth, it was quite a bit more than nothing. He’d been dreading it for half a year. It was impossible for him to hear the sound of guns being fired without thinking of things he didn’t want to remember. In Seattle, he and Zula had been seeing the same doctor for treatment of posttraumatic stress.

But lurking in the house all day wasn’t going to make that better, and going out to participate was unlikely to make it worse. And so after they wrapped up the Skype call with fond words and promises of future transatlantic visits, all of them except for Grandpa put on warm clothes and ear protection and shuffled out toward the crick. Jake was there, and Elizabeth, and the three boys. They had taken a week off from the cabin-rebuilding project to drive out from Idaho and check in with the extended family and lay flowers on John’s grave. The boys, homeschooled in the wilderness, had been an awkward fit with the crowd of mostly affluent suburban midwesterners who made up the re-u, but here they were in their element, moving up and down the line assisting their cousins with jams, giving them pointers in marksmanship. It was a relatively still day, which was a blessing for outdoorsmen, even though it meant that the wind turbines were not doing much.

Richard was examining one of those—he’d learned a lot more about them, now that he was handling some of John’s residual business affairs—when he saw an SUV turning off the highway into the gravel drive that led to the farmhouse. About a hundred feet in, it stopped at the checkpoint that the state patrol had set up, nominally to stop terrorists from coming here to wreak revenge on the Forthrasts, but also to keep media from coming in and making nuisances of themselves. Richard could not see through the windshield at this distance, but he could tell from the body language of the state trooper that the driver was one deserving of respect. The gate was opened and the SUV waved through. It came down the driveway with a searing noise, a plume of dust rising in its wake.

“They’re here,” Zula told him, her voice muddy through the earplugs. For she had apparently seen the same thing.

“I have to warn you,” Richard mentioned, “that he’s the most outspoken and cheerful colostomy patient who ever lived.”

“That’s good, right?”

“Cheerful is good. Outspoken can be a bit of a problem. Especially if he can’t keep his mouth shut about it during Thanksgiving dinner.” He looked at his niece. “His mouth, and his other orifices. See, now I’m doing it too.”

“Maybe he’ll be better behaved when he’s sitting next to Yuxia,” Zula suggested. “It’s just temporary, right?”

“What? Him and Yuxia? Who knows?”

“I was actually thinking of the colostomy.”

“That’s temporary,” Richard agreed. “The jokes about it, however, are eternal.”

They were strolling, side by side, toward the road. “How about you and Csongor?” Richard asked, glancing over his shoulder at the Hungarian, who was squeezing off rounds from a pistol while Jake critiqued his form.

“It might be permanent,” Zula said. “Who knows? If he can make it through today, and he still wants to have anything to do with me and my family, then maybe we can talk.”

“He’s made it through harder things than today.”

“This is differently hard.”