Page 163 of South of Nowhere

Mary Dove seemed unable to contain the smile when looking at Colter’s expression.

“My husband, Robert, and I met him and Mary Dove when we were both guest lecturing at Berkeley. We were journalists and had taken up the cause of writing about the rise of totalitarian movements in the world, the U.S. included.” She sighed. “We felt it was our mission to bring these movements to light. World War Two and Hitler’s coming to power began a mere hundred years ago—and death camps were only eighty. That is just a splinter of time in the history of the world. Would we like to believe we have quote ‘cured’ that type of dementia and sadism? Of course. Have we? No. Absolutely not.

“Your father helped us immeasurably. He was researching an aspect of the problem that we had not thought about: the relationship between corporations and totalitarianism. That was a mistake on our part. Ofcoursecompanies can facilitate fascism and nationalism. Look at the Krupp weapons company, which helped rearm the country under Hitler—who also leased state-of-the-art computer systems from America to identify and track Jews. Some historians believe the company was aware of that.” She took a sip of wine and looked knowingly at the Shaws. “And then some corporations are totalitarian entities themselves.”

“BlackBridge,” Colter said evenly.

The corporation their father exposed, with disastrous consequences.

Margaret grimaced and continued her narrative.

“Some of his research led us to a company in our home country.”A sour laugh. “On the surface it was a humanitarian aid nonprofit. It seemed to be doing good things, but in reality? It was an intelligence agency identifying dissidents. I continued to focus my research here, and Robert went overseas to interview someone inside the company.”

“He was there no more than a week before…” Her voice caught. “An accident. A car accident. On a straightaway, dry asphalt, and Robert never sped or drove dangerously.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I learned that I was in danger too. I do not know who in the U.S. government received what, but someone sold me out. And my visa was revoked. If I did not leave voluntarily I would have been deported—into the arms of the Ministerstvo Vneshneekonomicheskikh Svyazey.That’s the Ministry of Foreign Economic Relations.”

She laughed bitterly. “How isthatfor a pseudonym? It was really a brutal state security agency—the one responsible for Robert’s death. If I had gone back I would have been killed too. But you know your father—he was always thinking of ways to outwit Them. ‘Them’ with a capital ‘T’—the enemy that Ashton could see and so many others could not. And he came up with plan.”

Colter said, “Headoptedyou.”

She offered an amused glance his way.

Dorion said, “And you became a citizen?”

“Not automatically. There were still hoops to jump through. But it stalled the deportation, and eventually I did get citizenship. And then I went underground. New identity. My real name is Sarah.”

Ah, the Sarah in the letters. Ashton’s friend. Not his lover.

“I changed it to Margaret—after Margarete Momma. She lived in eighteenth-century Sweden and is considered the world’s first woman political journalist. I wanted to keep writing, but I knew I had to wait. In the meantime, Ashton got me a job as a teacher in a private school.”

Colter shared a glance with Dorion, who whispered, “We found the letter.”

“We thought it was about you gettingadmittedto a grade school as a student.”

After a beat of a moment, both Margaret and Mary Dove laughed.

Then their mother cocked her head. “So you thought Ashton had an affair with Sarah, and they had a baby, Margaret?”

Neither of the pair replied.

Mary Dove was not dismayed or disappointed at their assumption. “Understandable. It was a time when Ash was starting to slip away from us all. Besides, what was one of his most important rules?”

Dorion answered. “ ‘Never ignore the facts.’ ”

Their mother offered, “You heard he had a daughter, and you had no indication of her age, other than he’d apparently helped her get into elementary school. And he never mentioned anything about a Sarah or Margaret. Your assumption was logical. Of course…if you’d been less concerned about sparing my feelings and just told me about it in a phone call…”

Partly good-natured chiding. Partly gentle rebuke.

And, as always, she was right.

“So,” Margaret said, “that is the story of how I became your half-sibling and the daughter of a man three years younger than I was.”

Colter said, “The angry letters you wrote. The gun?”

“Oh, you found those too? I told you that somebody here—in the States—had betrayed us. After my husband was killed I went crazy, I will admit it. I wanted to find them, get revenge. I bought the gun from a street dealer on Eddy Street. I’d written a story about the gangs there and had some contacts. I played Hercule Poirot, trying to track down who had done it. But your father convinced me not to. He said revenge was not why God put me on earth. I was a journalist not a soldier. I gave up that idea and started reporting again.Carefully, of course, under various pseudonyms.” A wry, knowing glance. “But of course I kept the gun.” A glance toward her bag.

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