Penthesilea's Wish [Vol.1]

Chapter Thirty-nine

After making a number of domestic calls and few international inquiries about time zone differences of Europe, the professor was back on the phone that evening to Nicasio. The vintage Blackberry on his bed had rung just after eleven o' clock, at the moment he was about to dial Daniela for a late dinner. This had once been the hour of their usual communication on days they had not been together. On this day he had worked into the evening at the Doe Complex, Berkeley's main library, until closing time at ten PM. He had returned home only to shower and shave.

On seeing it was the professor's house phone, Nicasio reluctantly picked it up on the fifth ring.

"Nicasio, young man? You're home. Look . . . we're putting your fluency of Spanish on hold for a while . . ."

The professor sounded excessively wound up.

"Good evening, professor. Yeah? And . . . um why are we doing that?"

"Because you're going to Athens first, my boy."

"Athens? I am?"

"That's right. The tickets are ready and so is your itinerary . . . while you stay in Greece. You'll be leaving in three days."

"But Dr. Simons . . . I just began my work at the Doe today. I barely touched base with the Bancroft for permission to get into more secure manuscripts. . . If you're really expecting me to . . ."

"Don't bother. Those ship logs are of a secondary priority to us now. As I've told you . . . we have some serious new work to do, Nicasio."

"But I haven't even. . ."

"Look. Can you drop by my office tomorrow? Say, eight-fifteen?"

"Well . . . I wasn't really . . ."

"I need to introduce you to our enemy."

"Our . . . enemy?"

"Precisely. For starters a couple of women from Stanford."

"Stanford? Women?"

"Yes, Nicasio. Our enemy now it seems. I'll explain it all tomorrow. Until then . . . you need to know we'll be shifting our focus. Entirely now."

"Great," he said under his breath, and pulled the phone away from his ear. He stood motionless. Looking at it impatiently. He slowly lifted the weather-beaten Blackberry to the side of his head. "So what are we shifting to may I ask, professor?"

"Women researchers."

"Women researchers? Dr. Simons, what are you . . ."

"A group of them. Five I know of for sure. It's a sort of ad hoc consortium of some kind . . . but with a definite attitude."

"Excuse me?"

"They were all in Greece and Turkey . . . around ten years ago. But totally off the radar screen . . . from their academic departments."

"What were they doing there?"

"An emphasis on . . . some other women dear to our hearts . . ."

"Yeah? And who would that be, professor?"

Nicasio was beginning to think the professor was joking with him.

"Amazons."

"What? Oh . . . Wow."

"I've done some detective work on this, Nicasio. Stanford and our own Cal alums were involved in that concerted study some time ago. As well as were some women from institutions abroad. They were all unofficially linked."