Masquerade Read Free Page A

a tray of sandwiches and milk.
    â€œWhy am I locked in?”
    â€œWe’re sorry, but there just hasn’t been time to explain everything, Liz. You wouldn’t understand yet. We were afraid you’d try to run away. But you’re safe here, you need to eat, and we’ve sent for—”
    â€œWhere’s Gordon? Is he hurt badly?”
    â€œHe’s in the hospital. I don’t know how serious it is, but I’ll find out as soon as I can.”
    â€œWhat about the man I shot?”
    â€œDead. A clean kill.”
    She closed her eyes, nauseated.
    â€œYou had to shoot him, Liz. He would’ve killed you.”
    She steadied her stomach, forced her eyes open. “Are you the police?”
    â€œIn a way. We’ve sent for your doctor. He’ll be here soon. Now eat, okay?”
    She didn’t want to. She thought of Gordon and of the dead man. She bit into the first sandwich.
    â€œLiz, are you all right?” Dr. Levine hurried in, his long, gaunt face clouded. He turned on the overhead light, took a stethoscope from his bag, and checked her. “They tell me it was a close call.”
    â€œWho were those men? Why did they want to kill us?”
    â€œNot Gordon. You, I’m afraid. And yes, you’re certainly entitled to know why. But I warn you, finding out about your whole life in what amounts to a relative instant can be a shock, traumatic. If you begin to feel overwhelmed, stop. Finish tomorrow.”
    He left and returned with the photo album, the file folders, and the two video cassettes she’d begun to examine at the condo. She took them gratefully, and the thin man with graying hair rolled in a television set and VCR.
    â€œIs there any word about Gordon?”
    â€œSorry, Liz.” The doctor paused in the doorway. “I’ve given your medication to your security detail. They’ll get you some clothes, fix you up. You can trust them. Do they have to lock you in anymore?”
    She looked at the album, the cassettes, and the dossiers on her lap and shook her head. The doctor left. There was no sound of the door locking after him.
    Outside her window, stars sparkled across the black sky. She went to the desk and turned on the lamp. She opened the first file folder and began reading about her life.
    She’d studied international relations at Cambridge and moved in with a lover. The album contained dozens of photos, with typed lines of description, showing her with a dark-complected young man—in a tea shop, standing before the red-brick library, hiking along hedgerows, watching punters on the Cam. He had a serious face, smooth-cheeked, with coal-black eyes and hair. In almost every snapshot the hair tumbled over his forehead as if no force could control it or him. A dossier said his name was Huseyn Shaheed Noon, and he was a member of a prominent Pakistani family. He had returned home to tell his family about her, and while he was there he’d taken up his little plane for a recreational flight. The engine failed. He crashed and died.
    In the silent room she tried to recognize the solemn youth with the earnest eyes, but she couldn’t. She’d loved him. She must have been devastated to lose him. But what was love? She loved Gordon, still . . . she had no remembered experience of romantic love, and the concept, the hugeness and newness of it, was more than she wanted to deal with.
    Her parents had died, too, while she was at Cambridge. Killed by a mugger in New York City during one of herfather’s annual sales meetings. She felt a jolt of pain for this unremembered couple. Her parents.
    What would it take to retrieve her memory, to again feel their passing as the personal loss she knew it must have been?
    For a few moments she sat and thought of those two unknown people who had been her parents. With a long sigh she returned to her reading and received another emotional jolt.
    The year after her parents died she’d