Taken: Day 19

Word Count: 114,011

Summary of Events:

It took longer to shake his pursuers than Mitchell had expected, but he managed to lose them when he ducked into the back door of Walton's bar; he hid in the back washing dishes for the rest of the evening. The next morning Dolly suggested to him that he should try being a reporter again to see if he could actually get an interview with Odessa this time. He was able to make the arrangements for such a meeting and got up early so he could walk to a different hotel, from whence he was picked up by a taxi . . .

Excerpt of the Day:

The taxi pulled away from the curb and moved into traffic. Mitchell watched the scenery — mostly signs announcing businesses that weren’t necessarily open quite yet — go by as the sky gradually lightened and made the streetlights more and more redundant.

Gradually tall, square urban buildings that contained businesses gave way to housing, and not just any housing, but nice housing.

Broad streets with palms in boulevards between the directions of traffic were flanked by more palms both in front of and behind tall wrought-iron fences or Spanish-style adobe walls.

Everything was clean, immaculate, and beautiful as Mitchell was carried closer and closer to whichever house was the Edgar mansion.

The streets curved along hillsides and even though the sun was still low in the sky and not shining its fullest and brightest, it all looked quite picturesque and elite, the sort of residences Mitchell had never really seen in real life — although he tried not to show it.

After a rather long time the taxi pulled up to a pair of wrought-iron gates of elegant, curlicued shapes that filled in the opening between two long, straight, tall adobe walls. It took Mitchell a few moments to realise that the curlicues on the gates formed three letters: C, E, and M.

Because the man he’d made the appointment with had called Mr. Edgar Marion C. Edgar Mitchell presumed it was supposed to be seen as MCE.

An older man in a red-and-gold uniform sat in a gatehouse, looking sternly at the taxi. The driver looked at Mitchell. 

“What do I tell him?” the driver asked.

“Mr. Lincoln Darrow of the Dallas Star is here for his eight AM appointment with Miss Odessa Edgar,” Mitchell replied.

The driver rolled down his window and repeated what Mitchell had said to the gate guard, who checked a pocket watch.

“I will open the gate in five minutes,” he replied.

“You got that?” the driver asked, looking over his shoulder at Mitchell.

“I did,” Mitchell replied.

The driver nodded to the guard and rolled up his window.

“Am I correct to wager it’s ten to eight?” Mitchell asked.

“You are,” the driver replied, checking his watch.

Mitchell nodded and stared through the windshield and the gate at the looming form of the Edgar mansion.

No lights were on inside it, nor was there anything for lights within the fence, there was only a fountain whose waters weren’t flowing and the large, hispanic-style mansion, both lit from the left by the sun, which hung still somewhat low in the eastern sky.