He halted only when he was well clear of the burning house, panting with the effort. Nefer lay in his arms, inert. Was she alive or dead?
“Oh, Nefer!” he said. “I didn’t mean for you to get caught like that! You were so brave! I’ll never forgive myself if you die!”
She did not react. Then, chiding himself for his foolishness, he lifted her head to his face and kissed her with the passion of guilt and fear.
Now she responded, weakly. “You kissed me.”
“I did,” he agreed, relieved. This was the first time he had kissed her of his own volition. “You were unconscious.”
“Like kissing the princess awake.”
“Like that,” he agreed. “Are you all right? Can you walk?”
“I don’t know. I feel woozy and sort of bruised.”
“You were too near the explosion. That man landed on you, although his body shielded you from the flames. Oh, Nefer, I’m so glad you made it!”
“So am I.” She looked sharply at him, her wooziness dissipating. “You could have left me there.”
“They would have killed you!”
“Yes. Saved you some trouble. You know I still want to get you into my pants.”
“And you know I won’t do it.”
Again that calculating look. “Are you sure, Mister Slate?”
He had to be painfully honest. “No. Call me Abner; I think you have earned it.”
She was pleased. “Gee. Thanks, Abner.” Then she got serious. “You could have been sure, if you’d let me die. It would have been easy.”
“Not for me. I have a soul and a conscience. I couldn’t let you die if I could prevent it.”
“And maybe you want me, a little.”
He was supposed to play her along, not cutting off her hope, so that she would continue to help him. Was that really all there was to it? “Maybe.”
“And as you said, if you pretend long enough, you can maybe start being what you pretend to be.”
She had him in a neat trap. There was a guilty twinge of desire. She had become more of a person to him, less of a sopath. She was playing him as he was playing her. “Maybe by the time I’m ready to let you seduce me, you’ll have developed a conscience and won’t do it.” The subtext there was that she would never develop a conscience, and his capitulation was similarly unlikely.
“Maybe,” she agreed, satisfied. She was still a child and some things escaped her. All she saw was the chance she might succeed. He was deceiving her in her expectation, not his actual words. That was perhaps a fair compromise.
Nefer remained weak and dizzy, so he carried her back to her home. “You’ll tell your family something,” he said. “You need several days of rest.”
“I do. Kiss me again, Abner.”
He kissed her, feeling her passion again, appalled at himself for the temptation to respond to it, and then let her fade into the shadow.
Abner returned home. “We took it out,” he reported. “Nefer did it, really. I owe her, and she knows it. I’m letting her call me Abner. We’re using each other, but I can’t be sure who is winning.”
“We do play a dangerous game, in more than one respect,” Bunty said. “With luck this will finish our association with her.”
“With luck,” he agreed, not believing it. For one thing, he now owed her two get out of jail free cards.
Abner abruptly lost his job. Someone had sent his employer a note connecting him to a supposedly malign Pariah organization, and that was enough to promote a spot layoff. He could neither prevent the layoff nor prove the accusations were untrue. Paranoia was rampant, and he was just another casualty. The criminals had found another way to score.
“We can get by,” Bunty said. “My job will sustain us.” But they both knew that would only delay their bankruptcy.
“Pariah,” Clark said. “They need recruiters.”
Abner nodded. He put in an application.
News came down immediately from the national pariah office, as though they had anticipated his need. Maybe it was common among Pariah activists. They needed a traveling organizer, and he was a prime prospect. But there might be danger.
They hardly hesitated. Abner took the job. They decided to sell the house, buy a motor home, and travel as a family. That would get them out of their neighborhood while doing Pariah some good. Between the war with the criminals and his joblessness, this had become an awkward neighborhood to live in. It was summer, so school for the children was not a problem.
They got busy quietly organizing for the change of lifestyle. Abner discussed it with other Pariah members, arranging for another person to take over the local reins. They would not give up the campaign, but would be more cautious than Abner had been.
His caution was justified. Several days later Nefer appeared at his house. Bunty let her in the front door. She was coated in ashes and her hair was wild. “Mister Slate, I need your help.”
Abner exchanged a fleeting glance with Bunty. That formal address was surely significant. “What is it?”
“The crooks must’ve recognized me. They fire-bombed my house. I got my folks out, but I can’t stay with them any more.”
Clark and Dreda had joined them. “Why?” Clark asked.
“Because I’m dead.”
“You mean they will kill you, now that they have identified you and failed the first time?” Bunty asked.
“No. It’s complicated. Damn!” She looked confused, not able to speak coherently. It was getting to her.
Bunty looked meaningfully at Abner. He responded by going to Nefer, picking her up, then sitting in the easy chair, holding her close on his lap, her head against his chest. “Take your time,” he told her.
She melted, much as a real girl would. Her lack of a conscience did not affect her need for comfort, and he was perhaps the only one who could provide it. Then she talked. “I was out scouting around. Crooks are like sopaths; you can’t trust them. So I was alert. I heard something, so I sneaked around to watch without being seen. Someone was pouring water or something behind our house. It was a girl about my size. Then I saw a flash, and realized what it was: kerosene. They sent a sopath to firebomb my house, the same way as we firebombed theirs. It was another warning. They are striking back. They don’t care if I live or die, they just want me to stop bothering them.”
She paused, collecting her thoughts. Abner held her close and stroked her hair. He saw Dreda nod approvingly: he was pacifying the sopath. “True,” he agreed. “But that was not the whole of it.”
“It was too late to stop the fire,” Nefer continued. “But not too late to act. I ran up behind her and stabbed her through the back. Then I heaved her into the fire. Then I ran around, went inside where it wasn’t burning yet, and screamed to my folks to wake up, the house was burning. I really made a racket. I got them up and out. Then I told them: the firebombing was because of me, and they wouldn’t be safe as long as I lived. So I had to be dead. I told them how I caught the girl who set the fire and threw her into it. She had to be me, burned to death, and they had to accept that. So they would be left alone. They looked at the fire and believed. I left them and came here. Mister Slate, I need you to get me out of here, somehow, where I’ll never be recognized.”
“Yes you do,” Abner agreed.
“We can do it,” Bunty said. “We are about to travel.”
“I didn’t mean you had to be with me,” Nefer said. “I meant to put me in an orphanage or something where I’ll be anonymous and safe. I can’t do that myself, but maybe Pariah could.”
“No local orphanage would take you,” Bunty said. “You’re a sopath. They’ll be alert for that.”
“Some other town, then, where they don’t know about sopaths.”
Clark and Dreda laughed. The whole world knew about sopaths by now. But they had to do something for her.
A look passed around the family. The children nodded. Bunty pursed her lips, but nodded also.
“We’ll take you,” Abner sa
id. “We owe you.”
“You owe me a get out of jail free card,” Nefer said. “Only I want to be put in jail, to save my hide and leave my folks safe. I owe them that.”
And the girl did honor the deals she made, not from conscience but because she had learned that it paid in the long term to do so. She had to make it safe for her family.
“That’s a rational assessment,” Bunty said. “But we’re not entirely rational. We have consciences. You incurred this problem because you helped us fight the criminals. We’ll take care of you.”
“But you know I want to--” Nefer shrugged. “You know what I want.” She gazed at Abner, letting her longing show. Her desire for him seemed to have intensified rather than faded. He reminded himself again that as a sopath she lacked natural restraints. She was a child, but it was naked lust she felt.
“We do,” Bunty said. “But as I said, we are not entirely rational. We are prepared to take the risk, if you are prepared to behave like a family member. In fact, we can probably use you, because of your ability to identify other sopaths.”
“I’d rather be with you,” Nefer said. “But you don’t owe me that. I’m trying to be fair. It’s not easy for me.”
“It’s not easy for anyone,” Bunty said. “We will guide you. You know the general rules.”
“I do.” Then, relieved, the girl relaxed. They were settling their debt to her the hard way.
It was in the newspaper next day: a house had burned down, the adults had escaped, but their daughter had burned to death. There would be a funeral for her.
Nefer was officially dead.
They kept her out of sight, but did not change her name. It was a nickname anyway, not her legal one. She cooperated perfectly, knowing that discovery was likely to mean her death. She slept in a nook in the cellar, her rat hole as she called it. She donned a blond wig that transformed her appearance, and very innocent childish clothing. She was probably unrecognizable, even to those who had known her reasonably well.
“We need to incorporate Nefer in such a way that no one will ever suspect her nature,” Bunty said.
“You have something in mind?”
“She looks angelic. Maybe we could make her act angelic.”
“I am not following you.”
“We’ll be traveling as a close-knit family. We could be religious. At least to the point of attending local church services. Participating in their events.”
“I’m still not following.”
“Singing in the choir, for example. We can sing average, but Nefer can sing well. She told me she sang in her family’s choir.”
“But sopaths don’t give half a crap for religion.”
“But they can fake it, when they want to.”
Maybe it would help. “Let’s ask her, and hear her sing.”
“Nefer!” Bunty called.
The girl appeared almost immediately. “Whatever it is, I’ll do it.”
“We understand you can sing.”
“Sure, when I have to. I was the best singer they had in the choir.” Modesty was not a sopath trait.
“We’re thinking of singing in local churches as we travel,” Bunty said. “To seem more like a religious family. Will you join us?”
“You want me to?” Nefer asked Abner.
He was unwilling to let his leverage on her be the only reason. “Yes. But this is optional. Let me state my points.”
“That’s okay, Abner. I’ll do it for you.”
“First, it would help the Pariah culture effort, because not everyone can sing, and few can sing well. If you can sing well—well, a good lead singer can help the others stay on track, and make them seem better too.”
“I know. I did it all the time.”
“Second, it would help conceal your nature, because no one would think a sopath could sing a religious song.”
“That’s crazy! I don’t care about religion, but I do like to sing, because it’s a way to soften people up for whatever I want, and some of those hymns are really good for that.”
Bunty smiled. “We soulers have some crazy notions.”
Abner made a mental note: sopaths had no emotional appreciation for the arts, because those stemmed from symbolism and empathy. Nefer cynically used her talent to get things for herself, not for its own sake.
“Okay, let’s see what we have here,” Abner said. “See how we integrate.”
They assembled the family. “We’re about to see how well Nefer can sing,” Abner told the children. “And whether she can help us to sing a hymn better.” He looked at Nefer. “Is there one you prefer?”
“Oh Holy Night. It’s got flow and power, and people get all mushy over that.”
“Can you sing it a cappella?”
For answer, Nefer simply started singing. “Oh holy night, the stars are brightly shining. It is the night of our dear Saviour’s birth.” The others listened silently, surprised first that she clearly had no trouble with the tune, words, or religious theme, and second by the quality of her voice. She had not exaggerated; she was an excellent singer. Her tone was like a bell, and she had perfect pitch. It was a pleasure to listen to her. They were indeed getting mushy, as she put it.
Nefer continued through the whole hymn, hitting the high notes seemingly without effort, filling the room and the house with the power of her voice. “...oh night divine!”
Then she looked at Abner.
“You have a really beautiful singing voice,” he said, awed. “It sends shivers down my spine.”
“Okay,” Nefer said. “I’ll do it because I’ll do anything to oblige you, Abner, and because you’re right, it’ll hide me so I won’t get killed as a sopath. But mainly because the thought of sending shivers down your spine maybe all the way to your, your--”
“Manhood,” Bunty supplied with a smile.
“Yeah. That sends shivers through me. Maybe I can evoke your passion with my voice.” She was learning not to say “Get you to fuck me.” Abner appreciated that.
“Maybe you can,” he agreed, not insincerely.
That night he confessed his concern to Bunty. “That girl is too pretty, too clever, too talented. She is gaining on me. I fear where this is leading. I am revolted, but it’s there.”
“Don’t be concerned.”
“But Bunty, sometimes I even think I would like having sex with her. You mean everything to me, but she’s so ardent, so persistent. I am no longer seeing her quite as a sopath, or a child. She’s a cynical young woman.”
“Get real, Abner,” she said firmly. “We don’t live in the ‘nice’ culture we once did. We have to do things that would have been unthinkable before. We lie, we use people like her, we kill children, we kill grown criminals with souls. The old morality is dead. If I thought your having sex with a more-than-willing rational child would enable us to solve the problem of sopaths, I’d put you in bed with her and not let you out until you satisfied her. I know the children would agree.”
“You can’t be serious!”
“I am serious. But I don’t believe it would do the job, so it’s academic. If she had sex with you once, she’d expect it again, and there would be no end to it. It remains her best expression of the love she feels for you.” She smiled briefly. “I know exactly how that is. You have that magnetism springing from your soul, bending women to your will.”
“That’s really no credit on me.”
“The credit is your discipline and conscience. You are not allowing your power to corrupt you.”
“Thank you,” he said, bemused.
“We can use her, we need her, and she’s settling for little enough, considering her passion. Let’s let it rest there.”
“You frighten me almost as much as she does.”
“We’re women.” Then she set about seducing him, which required very little effort. He might feel some temptation for touching the girl, but he had a full-blown passion for the woman, and she knew it and shared it.
There was a problem with th
e motor home they found on sale: it slept four, two adults and two children. They could not afford more, and more would have been suspicious. Space was tight; there simply was not room for another person.
It was Nefer who came up with the answer. “We hope this puts off the criminals, and that they’re not after any of us anymore. But we can’t be sure. Someone needs to be on watch all the time. We can take turns around the clock, and when it’s my turn I swear I’ll be as good a watch as you can find. When I sleep, it will be in whichever bed isn’t being used by the one who is on watch. Or I’ll sleep in the daytime, hiding.”
“Something like that should work,” Abner agreed. Her intelligence also attracted him, but he couldn’t say that.
It took another two weeks to finally get things cleared and start moving. During that time they also practiced family singing, and Nefer continued to cooperate fully, enchanting them all with her beautiful voice. “She’s trying to be a full member of the family,” Bunty murmured during a tryst. “As she was with her original family. She’s eerily good at it. I confess I’m coming to like her.”
“She’s a sopath,” he reminded her.
“That’s what makes it eerie. It’s like having a tame rattlesnake in the house, uncaged.”
It was, indeed.
They departed without ceremony, the Pariahs knowing only that Abner had become a traveling organizer who didn’t want publicity because of the general prejudice against Pariahs.
The first night they parked in a park without connections, so it was little used despite being cheap. They were prepared with plenty of food and water. Bunty cooked a respectable dinner, they practiced singing a hymn, and they settled down for the night.
“I’ll take first watch,” Nefer said. “I’ll prowl the neighborhood to make sure no one is sneaking up on us.”
“Not just yet,” Abner said. “First we’ll have a family mission meeting. You can move around and peer out the windows, but you need to hear this.”
“There’s something we don’t know?” Clark asked.
“There is,” Bunty said. She knew the details, but had kept silent.
Then in darkness Abner informed the children of the rest of his mission. “The organization mission is a cover,” he said. “I will do it, going to a list of towns across the country, meeting with local Pariah groups and showing them how to organize and establish relations with the national organization. It will do them good, because they will have information and support. But the real mission is to investigate two mysterious towns, Sweetpea and Sauerkraut.”