Labyrinth of Night Read Free Page B

musician—plainly dressed in baggy dungarees with shirt sleeves rolled up above his elbows, hunched over the keys and digital fretboard of a Yamaha electronic guitar.
    It seemed impossible to Jessup that one person could entertain the vast ocean of faces that lapped at the shoreline of the stage, that his music would be drowned in the tide of humanity. Yet, as Cassidy played, Jessup found himself empathetically melding with the current: the crowd, the mid-afternoon heat, and above all else the music which flowed from Cassidy’s guitar. He was coming out of a blues number—Jessup, who had briefly been a blues fan in his college days, vaguely recognized it as Muddy Waters’ My Dog Can’t Bark, My Cat Can’t Scratch— and was gliding into free-form improvisation.
    As Jessup listened, be became increasingly fascinated. At first it seemed as if Cassidy was simply dog-paddling, thrashing without direction on the same couple of chords. Then he added a keyboard solo to the bass refrain and began holding a dialogue between the two sets of chords, shifting back and forth like an actor singlehandedly conducting a conversation between two characters. When it seemed impossible that Cassidy could carry this on much longer, the musician added a third refrain, a lilting lead guitar riff which joined into the mesh of notes. The crowd near the stage, mesmerized by this performance, shouted and applauded their approval but Cassidy, huddled over his instrument, face almost pressed against it, did not look up, nor even seem to notice that he had an audience.
    Jessup, listening and watching, suddenly realized why he had been sent to recruit Cassidy. He had heard the tapes of Hal Moberly’s encounter with Room C4-20. Jessup had wondered if Arthur Johnson was losing his mind when he suggested Cassidy’s name; it seemed improbable that the scientist would want anyone for Cydonia Base other than another scientist. Now, hearing Cassidy’s guitar, Jessup understood. His improvisational style was disturbingly similar to the music of Room C4-20.
    Jessup’s right hand moved involuntarily toward the inside pocket of his suitcoat before he stopped himself. The folded message inside would wait until he met Cassidy backstage after his gig. Abruptly, Jessup hated himself. He had studied Cassidy’s record, knew that the musician had been a draftee during Gulf War II. No one should be conscripted twice.
    No choice, though. The final puzzle of the Labyrinth had to be solved, at any or all costs.
    Cassidy ended his instrumental piece and, as the crowd went wild, he stood up for a moment to take a quick, solemn bow and reflexively scoot his stool back a couple of inches. As he did so, he glanced behind him and saw Jessup standing in the wings. Their eyes met and locked for an instant. Jessup caught the cool, appraising glare, the downturned mouth within the beard. Then Cassidy turned his attention back to his guitar and his audience.
    He pensively warmed up with a couple of notes, then edged into his next number. Jessup recognized the song immediately as Uncle Sam Blues.
Kennedy Space Center, Cape Canaveral, Florida: October 4, 0800 EST, 2029
    The unmanned cargo shuttle Constellation was an old bird, the last of her breed. Built in the early 2000s to ferry the final components of the first-generation Freedom Station into orbit, she was the last of the Rockwell ‘Delta Clippers’ to be rolled out to the launch pad. Her sister vessels were now on display in the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, the KSC visitors’ center on the other side of the Cape, and the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville.
    The Constellation was still flying, though, partly because no one at the Cape had the heart to put the last of the Delta Clippers out to pasture. The second-generation McDonnell-Douglas ‘Big Dummies’ were more efficient workhorses, but they were mostly owned and operated by Skycorp and other space companies. Although NASA flew