Once the police let me leave, I pushed my way through the milling crowd that had been drawn by the excitement and walked the three blocks back to my office. I told no one about the explosion. I went straight to my private cubicle and shut the door.

As evening fell, I was still sitting at my desk — wondering why the grenade had been thrown and how I had escaped being killed by it. Which led me to wondering why I have such physical abilities and whether those two strangers who disappeared from the bar had the same powers. I thought again about the young woman. Closing my eyes, I recalled from my memory the image of the ambulance that had taken her away. St. Mercy Hospital was printed along its side paneling. A quick check with my desktop computer gave me the hospital’s address. I got up from my desk and left the office, the lights turning off automatically behind me.

CHAPTER 2

It wasn’t until I pushed through the revolving door of St. Mercy’s main entrance that I realized I had no idea of the name of the woman I had come to see. And as I stood there in the middle of the frenetic, crowded, bustling lobby, I saw the foolishness of asking any of the harried-looking receptionists for help. For a few moments I was at a loss; then I spotted a uniformed policeman.

Step by step I went from one police officer to another, asking for information about the people brought in from the bombing earlier that day. I told them I was from the restaurant’s insurance company. Only one of the policemen, a burly black man with a handsome mustache, eyed me suspiciously and asked for identification. I showed him my group insurance card; he barely glanced at it, but it looked official enough to satisfy him. Perhaps my air of utter confidence also helped to convince him.

In less than a half-hour I entered a ward that contained sixteen beds, half of them empty. The nurse in charge led me to the bed where the young model lay, eyes closed, a flesh-toned plastic bandage taped to her forehead.

“Only a few minutes,” the nurse whispered to me.

I nodded.

“Miss Promachos,” the nurse called softly, leaning over the bed. “You have a visitor.”

The young woman’s eyes opened. Those lustrous gray eyes that seemed as deep as eternity.

“Only a few minutes,” the nurse repeated. Then she walked away, her soft-soled shoes squeaking on the tiled floor.

“You… you’re the one who saved me, in the restaurant.”

I could feel my heart throbbing wildly, and I made no effort to slow it. “Are you all right?” I asked.

“Yes, thanks to you. Only this cut on my forehead; they said I won’t need plastic surgery, it won’t leave a scar.”

“That’s good.”

Her lips curled upward slightly. “And a few bruises on my body and legs from being knocked down.”

“Oh. I’m sorry…”

She laughed. “Don’t be! If you hadn’t knocked me over…” The laughter faded. Her lovely face grew serious.

I stepped closer to the bed. “I’m glad you weren’t hurt seriously. I… I don’t even know your name.”

“Aretha,” she said. “Call me Aretha.” Her voice was a low, soft purr, totally feminine without being high-pitched or shrill.

She didn’t ask me my name, but instead looked at me with a gaze that seemed perfectly calm, yet expectant, as if she were waiting for me to tell her something. Something important. I began to feel uneasy, confused.

“You don’t know who I am, do you?” she asked.

My mouth felt dry. “Should I know?”

“You don’t remember?”

Remember what?I wanted to ask her. Instead, I merely shook my head.

She reached out and took my hand. Her fingers felt cool and calming on my skin. “It’s all right,” she said. “I’ll help you. That’s why I’m here.”

“To help me?” My mind was whirling now. What did she mean?

“Do you remember the two men who were sitting at the bar this afternoon?”

“The golden one…” His image was burning in my memory.

“And the other. The dark one.” Aretha’s face was somber now. “You remember the other one?”

“Yes.”

“But you don’t remember who they are, do you?”

“Should I?”

“You must,” she said, gripping my hand tightly. “It is imperative.”

“But I don’t know who they are. I never saw them before today.”

She let her head sink back on the pillows. “You have seen them. We both have. But you can’t remember any of it.”

I heard the squeak-squeak of the nurse’s footsteps approaching. “This is all very confusing,” I said to Aretha. “Why was the restaurant bombed? Who’s behind it all?”

“That’s not important. I’m here to help you recall your mission. What happened this afternoon is trivial.”

“Trivial? Four people were killed!”

The nurse’s hissing whisper cut through our conversation, “That’s all, sir. She needs her rest.”

“But…”

“She needs her rest!”

Aretha smiled at me. “It’s all right. You can come back tomorrow. I’ll tell you about it then.”

Reluctantly, I bade her good-bye and left the hospital.

As I walked slowly through the hospital’s busy maze of corridors, I paid no attention to the people rushing along beside me. Their individual tales of grief and pain were as far from me as the most distant star. My mind was boiling, seething, from the tantalizing scraps of information that Aretha had given me.

She knew me! We had met before. I should have remembered her, and the two men who had been at the bar. But my memory was as blank as a darkened, empty computer screen.

By the time I was walking down the front stairs of St. Mercy’s, looking up the street for a taxi, I decided not to go home. Instead, I gave the cabbie the address of my office building — where my personnel record was on file.

The externals are easy. My name is John G. O’Ryan. That had always made me feel slightly uneasy, as though it wasn’t the proper name for me, not my real name at all. John O’Ryan. It didn’t feel right. I am the chief of marketing research for Continental Electronics Corporation, a multinational firm that manufactures lasers and other high-technology equipment. My personnel file, as I searched through it on my desktop computer, said that I was thirty-six years old, but I’ve always felt younger…

Always?

I tried to remember back to my thirtieth birthday and found with a shock that I could not. My thirty-third birthday was clear in my mind: that was the night I had spent with Adrienna, the boss’ private secretary. It was a memorable occasion. Adrienna was transferred to the company’s London office a few weeks later, and ever since then I seem to have spent all my time with the computers and my work. I tried to recall Adrienna’s face and could not. Nothing came to my mind except the hazy recollection of dark hair, a strong, lithe body, and lustrous gray eyes.

Beyond my thirty-third birthday my mind was a blank. I frowned in concentration so hard that my jaw muscles started to ache, but I still could not remember anything more than three years back. No knowledge of who my parents were. No memories of childhood. I did not even have any friends outside the small circle of acquaintances here at the office.

Cold sweat broke out all over my body. Who am I? Why am I?

I sat in my little office for hours as evening deepened into darkness, alone in my quiet, climate controlled, chrome-and-leather cubicle, behind my sleek desk of Brazilian mahogany, and stared at my own personnel file on the desktop computer screen. There was not very much in it. Names. Dates. Schools. None of them made sense to me or touched the faintest wisp of memory.

I looked up at the polished chrome mirror on the wall across from my desk. John G. O’Ryan looked back at me: a stranger with thick, dark hair, an undistinguished face that had a slightly Mediterranean cast to it (why the O’Ryan, then?), just under six feet tall, with a trim build dressed in an executive’s uniform of dark blue three-piece suit, off-white shirt and carefully knotted maroon tie.