The Federal Building was on Market Street, just past the Liberty Bell, halfway between the waterfront and the Convention Center. In the shadow of Wells Tower.
DeWitt’s office was just a few blocks away.
As we drove up, people streamed past us on foot, first a few, then a lot, a thickening crowd, all rushing to the site of the bombing to see what had happened.
Calkin had said discreet, if not secret. I wondered how many of the people on the street knew about the luncheon, how many opposed it, and how many half-informed rumors and conspiracy theories—or conspiracy facts, for that matter—were swirling around. I wondered if there would be more violence.
We turned off Market Street and drove down a ramp, into the bowels of the Federal Building. Ralphs hustled me onto an elevator to the eighth floor, then down a short corridor and into a conference room, where she left me alone for what felt like ages.
I could feel the minutes ticking by and that white van getting farther from the city, or being painted or dismantled or hidden. It was incredibly frustrating.
For a while, I stared out the window—unfortunately out the rear of the building, so I had no view of whatever was going on down by the waterfront. The room I was in was totally different from the dim and dirty interview room at the Montgomery County police station, where I’d been interrogated last fall, out in the zurbs. It felt like a lifetime ago. This room looked more like something from a lawyer’s office than a police station: a richly stained wooden conference table and seats that were plush and comfortable, swiveling and reclining. The table had a Holocon setup in the middle, for remote holographic conferencing. Or maybe for monitoring the interviews in the room, since there didn’t seem to be any two-way mirrors.
Finally, Ralphs returned, and with her was Marcella DeWitt.
DeWitt rushed across the room, the concern plain on her face. She put her hands on my shoulders, not a hug, but not too far from it. “Jimi, are you okay?”
DeWitt was generally kind of brusque, no-nonsense. This was the most unguarded I’d seen her.
I smiled and started to tell her I was okay, but my voice caught on a swell of emotion as the reality of the past hour or so hit me. Suddenly, I was in tears and it caught me totally by surprise.
“It’s okay, honey. You’re okay,” she said, guiding me toward one of the chairs.
Ralphs put tissues, a pitcher of water and a stack of reusable plastic cups the table. “Your mother’s on her way,” she said with a quick, tight smile. “You sure you don’t want to wait?”
DeWitt cocked an eyebrow at me.
I nodded, wiping my eyes. “Yes, I’m sure. I think time is a factor.”
“I agree,” Ralphs said, filling three cups with water and placing one in front of me. She put a notepad and a pen on the table and sat in front of them. “So, I find it interesting that you were on the scene when this bomb went off. When we questioned you a few months ago, you said you had no interaction with CLAD, no idea why they might have been talking about you. Is that still your story?”
“It’s not a story,” I said, “and no, I’m not sure.”
“You’re not sure?” she echoed pointedly. “You mean you’re not sure you want to protect them any longer, now that they’ve escalated their tactics and people are getting killed?”
“Really?” DeWitt said. “My client is here of her own free will, a minor willing to proceed without her legal guardian here because she wants to share information with you, and you’re coming in like that?”
Ralphs looked back and forth between us for a moment, then said, “Okay. Ms. Corcoran, could you clarify what you meant by that?”
“Has CLAD claimed responsibility?” I asked.
Ralphs nodded and sipped her water. “They issued a statement to the press. All the press, actually, locally and nationally, saying they ‘struck a blow against those who seek to dehumanize chimeras, and the false allies who would legitimize that effort.’ So, are you ready to change your story?”
I rolled my eyes. She seemed smart—too smart for an idiotic question like that. “No, I’m not changing my story. I’m trying to share information that could be very relevant, but you seem like you’d rather be a jerk than listen.”
DeWitt looked down and pursed her lips, like she was trying to hide a smile.
Ralphs glanced at the Holocon module, which was probably recording us. “Okay,” she said, putting her pen to the notepad. “Share it then.”
“I was at the scene of the bombing because I was supposed to be in the bombing. I was invited to be at that luncheon by Reverend Calkin.”
She wrote a few words on the pad, then paused, her eye twitching. “You were?”
“Yes, I was.” I guess Reverend Calkin had been pretty discreet after all. “I was on my way there when I was abducted.”
“Abducted?” She raised an eyebrow, as if she found this hard to believe. With everything that had been going on, I’d forgotten exactly how much I had disliked her when we’d met before. It was all coming back to me.
“Yes. They put a hood over my head and pulled me into a van.”
“And when was this?”
“I don’t know, forty minutes ago? An hour? Ten minutes before noon. They drove me around for, like, fifteen minutes telling me why I shouldn’t go to the meeting.”
“And why was that?”
“They said it would make H4H look good. It would make them appear reasonable, willing to talk.”
“So then what happened?”
“When I refused to skip it, they dropped me off under the Ben Franklin Bridge. By then it was five after. I was already late, and I knew it would be even later by the time I got there, but I didn’t want them to keep me from going. So I ran to the museum. The bomb went off just as I was approaching it.”
“The people who abducted you. How many of them were there?”
“I think four. Maybe five. Three in the back with me, one or two in front.”
“What did they look like?”
“I don’t know, they had masks on.”
She looked at her notes. “Wait, I thought you had a hood on.…”
“Yes, but they took that off me.”
“I see.” She wrote for a few seconds, then cocked her head. “Seems like a bit of a coincidence, doesn’t it? They ‘abduct’ you, and just happen to make you late enough that you just happen to miss the bombing?”
DeWitt gave me a questioning look, letting me know that she would end the interview if I wanted, if Ralphs continued to be a jerk.
“No, of course not,” I said. “It’s not a coincidence at all.”
“Meaning what?”
“Meaning I think they knew about the bomb. I think maybe they were the ones who planted it.” I took a deep breath, knowing that what I was about to say was likely to make Ralphs more suspicious that I was somehow involved. At the same time, in my mind’s eye, I saw the explosion again, vivid enough that it made me flinch. I was hit by another wave of intense emotion, like a delayed reaction, as I thought about all the people who had died in the blast—both E4E and H4H, chimeras and those who had persecuted them. Reverend Calkin. My eyes welled up again, and I felt a pang of intense guilt that they had been in there and I hadn’t. “For some reason,” I said quietly, “they didn’t want me in there with the others when the bomb went off.”