Phases of Gravity by Dan Simmons Read Free Book Online Page B

found themselves inexplicably whisked from their comfortable apartment in Chicago to a drafty old rental house in Glen Oak. For Baedecker, memories of those times were as hazy and out of context as the thought of the manic paper and scrap-metal drives that had seemed to occupy his weekends and summers during their entire interlude there. Despite the fact that his parents were buried just outside of Glen Oak, he had not visited or thought of the town in a long, long time.
    Baedecker received the invitation in late May, shortly before embarking on a month-long business trip that would take him to three continents. He filed the letter and would have forgotten it if he had not mentioned it to Cole Prescott, vice president of the aerospace corporation for which he worked.
    "Hell, Dick, why don't you go? It'll be good PR for the firm."
    "You're joking," said Baedecker. They were in a bar on Lindbergh Boulevard, near their offices in suburban St. Louis. "When I lived in that little Podunk town during the war, it had a sign that said POPULATION 850—SPEED ELECTRICALLY TIMED. I doubt if it's grown much since then. Probably gone down in population, if anything. Not many people there would be interested in buying MD-GSS avionics."
    "They buy stock, don't they?" asked Prescott and lifted a handful of salted nuts to his mouth.
    "Livestock," said Baedecker.
    "Where the hell is this Glen Oak, anyway?" asked Prescott.
    It had been years since Baedecker had heard anyone say the town's name. It sounded strange to him. "About 180 miles from here as the provincial crow flies," he said. "Stuck somewhere between Peoria and Moline."
    "Shit, it's just up the road. You owe it to them, Dick."
    "Too busy," Baedecker said and motioned to the bartender for a third Scotch. "Be catching up after the Bombay and Frankfurt conferences."
    "Hey," said Prescott. He turned back from watching a waitress bend over to serve a young couple at a nearby table. "Isn't the ninth of August the beginning of that airline confab at the Hyatt in Chicago? Turner got you to go to that, didn't he?"
    "No, Wally did. Seretti's going to be there from Rockwell and we're going to talk about the Air Bus modification deal with Borman."
    "So!" said Prescott.
    "So what?"
    "So you'll be going that way anyway, pal. Do your patriotic duty, Dick. I'll have Teresa tell 'em you're coming."
    "We'll see," said Baedecker.
    Baedecker flew into Peoria on the afternoon of Friday, August 7. The Ozark DC-9 barely had time to climb to eight thousand feet and find the meandering path of the Illinois River before they were descending. The airport was so small and so empty that Baedecker thought fleetingly of the asphalt runway at the edge of the Indian jungle where he had landed a few weeks earlier at Khajuraho. Then he was down the ramp, across the hot tarmac, and was being urgently hailed by a heavy, florid-faced man he had never seen before.
    Baedecker groaned inwardly. He had planned to rent a car, spend the night in Peoria, and drive out to Glen Oak in the morning. He had hoped to stop by the cemetery on his way.
    "Mr. Baedecker! Mr. Baedecker! Jesus, welcome, welcome. We're really glad to see ya." The man was alone. Baedecker had to drop his old black flight bag as the stranger grabbed his right hand and elbow in a two-handed greeting. "I'm really sorry we couldn't get up a better reception, but we didn't know 'til Marge got a call this morning that you were comin' in today."
    "That's all right," said Baedecker. He retrieved his hand and added needlessly, "I'm Richard Baedecker."
    "Oh, yeah, Jesus. I'm Bill Ackroyd. Mayor Seaton would've been here, but she's got the Old Settlers' Jaycees Fish Fry to take care of tonight."
    "Glen Oak has a woman mayor?" Baedecker resettled his garment bag on his shoulder and brushed away a trickle of sweat on his cheek. Heat waves rose around them and turned distant walls of foliage and the half-glimpsed parking lot into shimmering mirages. The humidity was as