Out of Nowhere (The Immortal Vagabond Healer Book 1) Page 5

  I thanked her and gave an ironic exaggerated bow, but it was probably wasted as she had already returned her attention to her phone. I made my way through dusty stacks to the back of the library.

  This was where they kept the books nobody read. Ancient languages, philosophies and politics that had gone out of fashion, history that nobody wanted to remember; probably so they wouldn’t feel so stupid when they repeated it.

  I hadn’t realized there were offices back here, but there were two brass plates screwed onto one of the doors, indicating a shared office. I could imagine a professor of ancient languages requesting such a place. They tend to be an odd bunch. Linguists who deal in current languages are generally alright, since they talk to living people. If all you study is what a handful of bureaucrats and philosophers left behind in a tongue nobody has heard in a millennium, you get a bit rusty on social interaction. I prepared myself for an elderly, pallid, bespectacled gentleman in a tweed jacket with elbow patches. The door was slightly ajar, after the fashion of doors that open onto the offices of the absentminded, so I just gave a courtesy knock and stepped through.

  It was a typical shared office; a window directly across from me opening onto the pleasant rolling green of the quad; a desk facing each side wall, so nobody had a good view of either the door or the window; bookcases and posters on the walls. Cats figured heavily in the posters on the side with the unoccupied desk, as well as Mel Gibson dressed as Hamlet and Sting in a puffy shirt on the grassy courtyard of a romantic castle, apparently reading. Someone was sitting sideways to me at the other desk.

  ‘Excuse me,’ I began, ‘I’m looking for Professor Deyermond—’ and I stopped dead.

  ‘That would be me,’ came the reply.

  I was right about the glasses, but that was all. Regarding me over the rims of those glasses through the most amazingly green eyes on the planet, in place of a pale, greying old man muzzily annoyed that I’d intruded on his session with Plutarch, was a breathtaking blonde in her late twenties.

  To be fair, she did exhibit a few signs of absentmindedness. She was poring over two books at once, making notes in a third; she held a pen in one hand, and had another tucked behind her ear. An impressive mass of loose golden curls was rumpled from the hand she was running through it as she worked, and stray wisps trailed over her forehead. She was dressed modestly enough in the finest academic tradition: a grey cardigan over a white blouse, the top two buttons undone and the collar gaping slightly as she bent over the book. A glittering pendant on a silver chain hung down just to the top of the shadow that teasingly hinted at cleavage. Long, shapely legs emerged from a knee-length black skirt, sheathed in black stockings and ending in black, low, fairly sensible shoes.

  When she saw me, and my sentence died without any sign of continuing, she raised one perfect eyebrow, took the pen she had been chewing from between her teeth and curled her lips into a smile that was warm and inviting, but had mischief in it. Her glance flicked from the fencing bag slung over my shoulder to my clumsily bandaged hand.

  ‘If you’re looking for books on fencing, there’s a nice copy of Talhoffer two rows back, but I can save you some time and tell you you’re probably holding the wrong end of the sword.’

  At that moment, something happened. A tightness in my throat and my chest and, to be honest, my loins. I knew Dr Deyermond was probably not the most beautiful woman in the world, but that’s a hard thing to judge, especially across centuries. Cleopatra, for example, would need the services of an orthodontist if she were to vie for an emperor’s affections today, and with a six-week aerobics class and a decent salon, Lady Godiva might have set western civilization back a century with that ride of hers. That said, I couldn’t remember the last time I had been so attracted to someone.

  For a man of my talents, long-term relationships don’t work. You can only stay young so long while people age around you before they start becoming suspicious, and while I could always shore up the youth of my companions, like the World’s Oldest Cat, humans never accept such things with good grace. So I’d had a fair number of lovers over the centuries; but something about this woman had my pulse racing like at no time I could remember.

  I dragged my attention back to the task at hand. ‘Sorry,’ I smiled. ‘You teach a course in ancient languages?’

  ‘I do. I studied ancient languages and the theory of language development for a long time. How trade, travel, writing and so on affected the evolution of languages.’ She shrugged. ‘But that’s not as lucrative as it sounds, so mostly I teach English Lit. Were you looking to take a class on ancient languages? It’s only the second week of the term. I could add you.’

  ‘Actually, I was looking for help deciphering an old inscription. Or at least nailing down the period and region.’

  Her smile remained in place, obviously hiding her disappointment that I wouldn’t be attending her class. ‘I may be able to help. Where is this inscription?’

  ‘It’s on a knife. An archeological find, probably a ceremonial weapon,’ I lied.

  ‘Where was it found?’

  I was ready for this one. ‘In the ruins of a country manor in England. The family was minor gentry going back forever, long tradition of soldiering and diplomatic service, so this could have been dug up in a bog on the estate or carried back from anyplace the Brits went.’

  Her smile widened. ‘Which narrows it down to...?’

  ‘Pretty much the whole planet,’ I admitted. ‘I can usually get at least a basic idea about languages, but this is totally new to me. I was hoping you could point me in a direction.’

  ‘I’ll try,’ she said. ‘Do you have a photo of the knife or a rubbing of the inscription?’

  ‘Nothing quite so good,’ I said, digging out my notebook. ‘I have a freehand copy.’

  ‘Let’s see.’ She pushed aside her books. ‘I’ve been staring at this for too long anyway. Too much epic poetry is bad for you. Almost as bad as too many romance novels.’ As I crossed the room to her desk, she stretched, uncrossing those long legs, rolling her head to ease her neck muscles and arching her back. While I’m sure this relieved the tension of sitting hunched over an obscure Chanson de Geste, it also showed off how white the skin of her long neck was, and how her firm breasts strained the fabric of her blouse when she moved that way.

  I swallowed hard as I handed her the paper. ‘It’s not very exact. I figured I’d compare it to some books and see what looked close. I didn’t expect you to be so helpful.’

  ‘Please.’ She took the sheet from me. ‘By this time of day I’m happy to talk to somebody born in the last century.’

  ‘A standard I shall do my utmost to live up to,’ I replied with a grin.

  ‘Sorry, that sounded wrong.’ She blushed, just a bit, but enough to make my pulse speed up. ‘Again, I plead too much time with dead scribes. Well, dead scribes and very young college students. My finer manners sometimes take a beating.’

  ‘No problem. I completely sympathize. I’m a paramedic, so when nobody’s bleeding or unconscious, I’m not sure how to act.’ I extended my hand. ‘Sean Danet.’

  ‘Sarah Deyermond.’ She took my hand with an elegant, palm-down, fingers curled grace that would have passed muster in the court of Queen Victoria. It seemed so natural that I wasn’t sure if she was playing or not. I resisted the urge to click my heels and kiss it.

  ‘Now, let’s see if I can help you.’ She studied the paper, her brow creased. One by one, she went through the classic stages of thinking. She adjusted her glasses, tapped her pen, chewed her pen, looked at the page from a slightly different angle, and ran her free hand through her hair. At length she made the face that people do when they’re trying to figure out how to break bad news. ‘Are you sure this isn’t a fake? There was a lot of phony medievalism in the Victorian era. Maybe some gentleman wanted to make it look like there was a pre-Roman society living on his estate and commissioned the weapon. Any smith could have put these mysterious symbols on it.’

&
nbsp; ‘It’s possible,’ I conceded. ‘I didn’t recognize the writing, so I thought I’d look into it.’

  ‘Sorry.’ She looked like she meant it. ‘I wish I could be more help. I mean, you can check the stacks if you want, but if there were anything close to that here in this library, I should at least have a clue. I spend enough time here.’

  ‘Not at all.’ I smiled. ‘Thanks for saving me an hour of poking around to not find anything.’

  ‘Well, I’m happy I could do that, at least. See you around?’ It really seemed sincere.

  ‘I’ll make a point of it,’ I replied, bowing my head as I made to leave.

  She rolled her head again, working out the kink in her neck and pushing my buttons. I hesitated in the doorway. She looked burned out on research. And she had sounded sincere about seeing me around. And for whatever reason, she had me snorting and pawing the ground.

  ‘Actually, I have that hour you saved me, and you look like you could use a break. You want to grab a cup of coffee or something?’

  She looked a bit surprised, but not unpleasantly. ‘In all honesty, I could really use a bite to eat and a beer. I wouldn’t mind the company, if you don’t have anything you’d rather do.’

  ‘My car’s in the student lot,’ I offered.

  ‘Mine’s closer,’ she replied, ‘but I think a walk would do me good. Let’s take yours.’

  ‘Alright, but I’ll warn you. You may feel the need to throw yourself at me when you check out my sweet set of wheels.’

  ‘I will try to restrain myself,’ she said, smiling, ‘emotional creature though I am.’

  We arrived at my car. It was a ten-year-old Chevy Impala, which I bought second-hand, and while the registration said it was green, in January the color was really grey beneath a fine patina of road salt. I haven’t ever been much of a car guy. They get me around and they are generally less fragile than a horse, but you can’t eat them when they break down on a long journey in the wilderness.

  ‘Your chariot, my Lady.’ I opened the passenger door and brushed some crumbs from the seat, noting happily that the interior was less cluttered than usual. No woman wants to rest her shoes among a pile of empty Styrofoam coffee cups and crumpled paper takeout bags.

  I tossed my fencing bag in the trunk and came around to the driver’s seat.

  ‘So what does this car say about you?’ she asked.

  ‘That I’m cheap, but low maintenance and reliable, I hope.’ My car responded by starting readily despite the cold. ‘I call him Vlad, by the way.’

  She looked at me quizzically for a moment before laughing. ‘Vlad the Impala?’

  ‘Fewer people get that than I hoped,’ I admitted, pulling out of the space.

  * * * *

  We ate at a small brew pub a mile from the campus. I’d driven past it and been intrigued, but hadn’t been inside before. It was a nice, quiet place in a converted mill building, all age-blackened wood and exposed brick. Part of the nascent American Foodie movement, they had a small selection of beers brewed on the premises and simple, dressed up bar food. Sandwiches, soup and salads, but all fresh and well seasoned. What Europeans have been doing all along while America had its love affair with fast food.

  We ordered pints and sandwiches and started the usual get-to-know-one-another conversation. I already knew that she had an unusual affinity for epic poetry and good beer. Made me happy I got to her before Malory; all that courtly-love drivel he put into Le Morte d’Arthur was just a ruse to help him get into as many skirts as he could. One of the great brawlers, lechers and convicts of the fifteenth century, revered by professors in tweed and dreaded by schoolchildren everywhere. But I mostly disliked him because he wrote about a sixth century Briton, a war chief, and didn’t get one damn detail right.

  Not that I could have believably corrected him.

  I kept my own fiction more vague and uninteresting but, unlike Malory, I made sure it fit with known facts and appearances. Over a brown ale and a grilled chicken pesto sandwich, I spun a tale of a middle-class upbringing: French-Canadian father, Irish mother, mediocre student, brief enlistment in the reserves and five years chipping away at a History degree while working on an ambulance.

  The key to a good secret identity is to make it mundane enough that nobody feels the curiosity to dig deeper, but give it enough details to cover and explain what people do see. There were hundreds of people along the Massachusetts-New Hampshire border with the exact same story. It also covered any mannerisms I might have picked up in far too many years in uniform, or historical facts that seemed too obscure for a humble ambulance jockey to know.

  ‘So, why study history?’ she asked, smiling over the rim of her glass. ‘Seems like a strange choice for a medic. Why not biology? Work towards a degree you can use?’

  ‘I see I’ve given off the mistaken impression of ambition,’ I replied. ‘I’m too lazy for Med School, and have no desire to drag hoses or wipe other people’s backsides, so that’s firefighting and nursing out. Other than that, there’s no logical next step for a paramedic, so I study what interests me. History is just stories about people. People who lived a long time ago, maybe, but stories just the same. How about you? I confess, you’re a lot younger and prettier than I expected in an English Lit professor. Not that I’m complaining, mind.’

  She blushed attractively. ‘I guess I like stories too. I always liked stories but in Grad School I realized what those stories could tell us about how people lived.’

  Oh boy, I thought, if she really believes in the princess in the tower, best back away slowly.

  She must have caught something in my expression. ‘Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think the works actually show life as it was. That’d be like basing your opinion of our culture on Lifetime Original Movies and Danielle Steele novels.’

  OK, maybe she was too smart for Malory.

  ‘What the works tell us,’ she went on, pausing to lick some errant sauce from her thumb and push my pulse up a few more points, ‘is what people wanted to read, to believe. To fantasize about.’ She smirked, looking at me over the top of her glasses with those big green eyes. ‘Don’t you wonder if people back in the fifteenth century fantasized about the same things we do?’

  I took a breath, covering my agitation with a deep pull that emptied my glass. I wasn’t sure how much of it was deliberate, but she was pushing my buttons, playing me like an artist. Was she just flirting, or was she really interested, really giving me an opening?

  I decided to push back, just a little. ‘Right now I’m having a good lunch and a good beer with an attractive, intelligent blonde. I bet most guys are fantasizing about being me.’

  She dropped her eyes and blushed again. Bullseye. She was interested and, strangely, not used to being told she was beautiful.

  In my experience, very pretty, articulate women don’t tend to remain available for very long, but she certainly didn’t act like she was in a relationship, nor did she exhibit any of the signs of the recently liberated. I had noticed the lack of a ring on her left hand, but that didn’t mean much. I could make a snide observation that it didn’t mean much these days, but it really never had when the cards were actually on the table. All that matters, all that has ever mattered, is whether she wants to play. Single, married, engaged or living in sin, a woman is either happy in her situation, in which case you won’t get anywhere, or she’s looking for something, in which case all’s fair.

  Now, the existence of a husband, lover or protective father might increase the risk to life and limb, but it doesn’t change your actual chances any. And I’ve risked life and limb for far less reward.

  Like trying to keep North Africa French or India British.

  Although it must be said that both England and France have better restaurants today because of our noble sacrifice.

  I decided to try a direct approach. I leaned forward across the table and flashed my sincere and charming smile, the one I’ve put centuries of practice into. ‘What about you? Is t
here a handsome prince in the wings? Or even just a jealous boyfriend who’s going to take advantage of my injury to challenge me to a duel?’

  Her smile remained, but it lost some of the bantering quality and took on a hint of sadness. ‘There’s been a shortage of handsome knights riding to the rescue for quite a while now,’ she sighed. ‘I work on a college campus with about six thousand women between the ages of eighteen and twenty-two, most of whom are away from parental scrutiny for the first time. I’m not even a blip on the radar. This is the closest to a date I’ve been on in forever.’

  There it was again. Just like working with Nique. For some reason, I project an aura of non-threateningness that makes women open up even when I’m actively on the job. ‘Well, then you’re surrounded by some very clueless men. Any straight male with a pulse should notice you.’

  ‘Thank you.’ She smiled. ‘It’s really nice that you did notice.’

  We finished our meal and I drove her back to her office. ‘Are you busy later?’ I asked, as she got out of the car. ‘Or can I call you sometime?’

  ‘Why, Mr Danet,’ she said playfully, ‘what kind of girl do you think I am?’

  ‘It’s more what kind of girl I hope you are,’ I grinned.

  She laughed. ‘Actually, I really do have papers to grade tonight. Honest. But give me your number; I should be free later in the week. I’ll see if I can hunt around for any more info on that inscription for you.’

  I gave her my number, not asking for hers. Put the ball in her court, don’t push too hard. ‘I will count the minutes until I hear from you.’

  ‘Thanks. It really was nice meeting you. I’m sorry I couldn’t be more help with that writing.’

  ‘Not at all. I’m glad I stumbled into your office.’

  ‘Me too.’ She smiled warmly. ‘I’ll be in touch.’

  Chapter 8

  I WALKED INTO THE APARTMENT to the sound of a ringing telephone. I’d normally ignore it, but part of me, probably the part located between my knees and my sternum, urged me to pick it up, hoping it would be Sarah.