Among the Betrayed (3 page)

Nina stared back at the man in confusion.

“What . . . what was I arrested for?” she asked quietly.

“Treason, of course,” the man said, almost cheerfully. “You betrayed your country.”

“How?” Nina asked again.

“Hey, who's supposed to be asking the questions here?” the man protested. He answered her anyway: “You
and this Jason—Scott?—what should I call him?”

“Jason,” Nina whispered. “He's Jason.”

“Okay. Whatever. You and this Jason tried to trick the Population Police into paying you for turning in a bunch of so-called exnays—illegals trying to pass themselves off as legitimate citizens. Just what I said before. Except all the supposed ‘exnays' actually
were
legitimate citizens, some of them with very powerful and well-connected families. Just think if the Population Police had fallen for your little ploy . . .”

Nina stopped listening. She had never felt so thickheaded and stupid before in her life. None of this made sense.

“You don't think
I'm
an illegal third child with a fake I.D.?” she asked cautiously.

“Of course not,” the man said. “There's no evidence of that. And if you were an exnay yourself, why would you betray your own comrades?”

Nina closed her eyes, afraid the man might see how relieved she was. She felt like turning cartwheels right there in her jail cell.
They don't know!
she wanted to scream. They wouldn't be tracking down Gran and the aunties, and her mother, to arrest all of them for hiding her. No one at Harlow School would get in trouble for harboring a fugitive. The Population Police wouldn't kill Nina for being illegal.

No. They'd just kill her for something she hadn't done. Treason? Turning in exnays?

Nina opened her eyes, gave the hating man her most indignant stare.

“There's been a mistake,” she said firmly. “I never tried to turn in any exnays. I never tried to get the Population Police to pay me.”

The man whipped out a little notebook and began to write.

“Ah, now you're talking,” he murmured. “I knew you'd come to your senses and try to blame Jason, just like he tried to blame you. No honor among thieves, I suppose.” He stopped writing but kept his pen poised over the paper. “So, what's your story? You gonna be the poor, innocent little girl who just did what Jason told you? It always helps if you cry during that one.”

Nina felt like he'd slapped her.

“No, really,” she protested. “I didn't do anything. And Jason didn't, either. I'm sure of it.”

“So you can vouch for Jason?” the man asked. “His whereabouts and his actions, every minute of every day?”

“No, but—”

“But what?” The man was smirking now.

“But I
know
Jason. I know he'd never do anything like that.”

“Just like you know he'd never betray you,” the man said.

“Right! Exactly!” Nina said eagerly.

The man pulled a rectangular plastic case out of the inside pocket of his jacket. He twisted around again and
yelled, “Guard?” Moments later the guard appeared and passed a metal box through the bars.

“Ever seen a tape recorder before?” the man asked Nina.

“No,” Nina said.

“Well, that's what this is. We can record anything anyone says. On a tape.” He held up the plastic case he'd taken out of his pocket. He slipped the tape into the recorder. “And once we've recorded something, we can play it back as many times as we want.” He pushed a button.

Nina heard a whirring sound, then a voice. The tape was a little crackly and hard to hear, like TV on brownout days. But Nina still recognized the voice: Jason's. She leaned forward eagerly, as if Jason were really there and she could throw herself in his arms.

“And Nina said to me, ‘Did you ever see those commercials on TV? About third kids and how the Population Police want to hunt them down?' She said, ‘I bet they'd pay good money if we turned somebody in.' And I said, ‘I don't know any third kids.' And she laughed and said, ‘So what? All we have to do is pretend. We can turn in anybody we want. And we'll get a reward.' And I said, ‘But that's
lying!
That's wrong! We can't do that.' But then she made me—you know how girls are.”

Nina reached out and grabbed the tape recorder. She hurled it at the opposite wall as hard as she could. It cracked hitting the concrete; the tape crashed out when it fell to the floor. Nina strained to reach for the tape because she wanted to destroy it, too. But the man was quicker
than she was. His hand closed around the tape as Nina's handcuffs bit into her wrists, holding her back. He put the tape back in his pocket.

“Now, now,” he said. “What a temper.” He pulled his notebook out again. “So can I put you on record as saying exactly what Jason said, only with the names reversed? And
Jason
said to me, “I bet they'd pay good money if we turned somebody in.” . . . And I said, “But that's
lying!
It's wrong! We can't do that!” ' ” He made his imitation of Nina's voice prissy and falsetto and incredibly childish.

Nina didn't answer. She turned her face toward the wall so the man couldn't see that she was crying. Vaguely a thought flickered in her mind,
This isn't a nightmare. Even nightmares are never this bad.

“Do I take your silence for agreement?” the man goaded her. “But what are you agreeing to? That you want to betray this Jason you knew so well, the way he betrayed you? Or that what he said was right, and you're to blame for everything? Which is it?”

Nina forced herself to look back at the man.

“I,” she said fiercely, “will never agree with anything you say.”

“Hmm,” the man said. “That's interesting. Because I was about to make you an offer that could save your life. But it appears you're not in the greatest of moods at the moment. Guess my offer will have to wait.”

He stood up and took his chair and the pieces of the broken tape recorder and let himself out of her cell. Nina
kept her head turned away from him so she could sob facing the wall.

But when Nina was sure he was gone, she looked back and saw that he'd left behind a white handkerchief, neatly folded, perfectly pressed. Nina grabbed the handkerchief and crumpled it into a ball, ready to hurl it at the wall as well. But a handkerchief wouldn't hit with as much satisfying force as the tape recorder had. A handkerchief would only float gently to the ground, like a bird finding a safe perch.

Nina looked around to make sure no one was watching, then loudly blew her nose.

N
ina ate the bread, too. She was disgusted with herself, that she could gobble up every crumb and eat the wormy apple down to its seeds. She should be pining for Jason, sobbing endlessly like some poor spurned heroine in one of Aunty Zenka's books. But Nina wasn't heartbroken anymore. She was mad. The food just gave her more energy for fury.

“I was a Ninny Idiot,” she muttered to herself. “I deserve my name.”

How could he? How could Jason have stood there in the moonlight, night after night, gazing into her eyes so lovingly, then turn around and do this? Had he been planning to betray her even a month ago, the first time he'd whispered in her ear, “Why don't we let the others go on back? We still have a few more minutes, just for us”? And then he'd held her hand and nuzzled her neck, and Nina had felt weak clear down to her toes. Even now she could still feel the sensation of his hand against hers, the pressure of his lips on hers. She had relived every kiss, every touch, so many times. Her ears could still bring
back the sound of his voice, whispering, “I love you.”

But he hadn't loved her. He'd told the Population Police she'd done something evil, and they were going to kill her for it.

Nina spit out an apple seed with such force that it bounced across the floor.

She'd made a total fool of herself over Jason. She could remember all those meetings they'd held out in the woods, when she'd stared at him adoringly and said stupid things. Flirting. She could remember one time when a new boy, Lee Grant, had started coming outside, too. Jason was telling Lee about the rally that Jen Talbot had held, to demonstrate for the rights of third children. And Nina hadn't contributed a thing to the conversation except to echo Jason, “The rally . . .” She wasn't capable of saying anything intelligent, because she wasn't really listening to the conversation, just watching the dim light on Jason's face, admiring his strong profile. Studying the perfect slope of his nose.

Idiotic.

Even before that, before the first time she and Jason kissed, she'd flirted in a different way, acting big, making fun of males. “Well, isn't that just like a boy!” she'd said probably a hundred times, with a simpering, stupid look on her face. She'd felt like she was acting in one of Aunty Zenka's TV dramas. All she needed was a ball gown and one of those dainty little fold-up fans to wave in front of her face whenever she said something particularly precious.

Ridiculous. That's how she'd really looked—ridiculous. How had she forgotten? She was a gawky thirteen-year-old with thin braids hanging down on either side of her face. Even if she'd had the ball gown and the fold-up fan, they would only have made her look sillier.

No wonder Jason had betrayed her. No wonder Sally and Bonner had inched away from her in the woods, like they didn't want to be seen with her.

Nina wanted to cry again, but the tears didn't come. Her heart felt like a rock inside her chest. Everything around her was cold and hard and merciless: the concrete walls, the cement floor, the iron bars of her door. She had thought she could wrap herself in her memories of being loved—by Jason, by her friends at Harlow, by Gran and the aunties. But Jason's love was fake. Her friends hadn't defended her. And Gran and the aunties seemed so far away and long ago that it seemed like it was some other little girl they had loved. Some little Elodie that Nina could barely remember.

Nina fell asleep, dry-eyed and hard-hearted, just one more cold thing in the jail.

“H
ere's the deal,” the man said.

It was the middle of the night again, Nina thought, blinking stupidly and trying to wake up. The overhead light was blinding again. She felt dizzy from lack of food. Two crusts of bread and one small apple—in what, a day and a half?—did almost nothing to stave off hunger.

“We think you can be useful to us,” the man was saying smoothly. He was holding out his hand to her. Nina blinked a few more times and made her eyes focus. What the man had in his hand was too incredible to be believed: a sandwich. And it wasn't black bread and moldy cheese, the kind of sandwich Nina was used to, but a towering bun, thick and golden brown, with pale pink curls of—was that ham?—
ham
overflowing the sides. Nina had seen such a thing only on TV, on the forbidden channels that showed life before the famines.

“Here. Take it,” the man said, waving the sandwich carelessly before Nina's eyes.

Nina had half the sandwich shoved in her mouth before she was even conscious of reaching for it.

“I see nobody ever bothered to teach you manners,” the man said in disgust.

Nina ignored him. The sandwich was divine. The bun was light and airy and hid a slice of pungent cheese along with the ham. There were other flavors, too—the words from an ancient commercial flowed through Nina's mind: “Lettuce, tomato, pickle, onion . . .” Nina wasn't sure if that was actually what she was eating, but the sandwich was wonderful, absolutely perfect. She slowed down her chewing, just to savor it longer.

“That's better,” the man said huffily. Nina had almost forgotten he was there. He handed her a bottle to drink from, and the liquid it contained was delicious, too, sweet and lemony. Nina drank deeply, thinking of nothing but her thirst.

When the sandwich was gone and the bottle was empty, she finally looked back at the man.

“A . . . a deal?” she said hesitantly.

“By law, we could have executed you the day we arrested you,” the man said. “But sometimes even the Population Police can benefit from ignoring certain aspects of the law.”

Nina waited, frozen in her spot.

“Oh, not that we would
break
the law,” the man said. “Given the importance of our mission, there are loopholes written specifically for us. Say we have a criminal in front of us who might be rejuvenated to serve our needs. What purpose is there in executing her?”

“What,” Nina asked through clenched teeth, “do you want me to do?”

The man shrugged. “Nothing that you and your buddy Jason weren't pretending to do anyway.”

The words flew out of Nina's mouth before she could stop them: “Would Jason help me?”

“Jason, alas, did not seem as useful as you,” the man said with an even more careless shrug.

“So he's—”

“Dead? Of course,” the man said. “Swift and efficient justice, that's our motto.”

Nina felt like everything was falling apart inside her. Her lips trembled.

“Now, now,” the man said. “Don't give me any of that fake grief. He betrayed you, remember? Didn't hesitate an instant to stab you in the back when he thought it would save his own neck. Which it didn't, naturally. But I guess someone who would betray his own country wouldn't care in the least about betraying a mere girl.”

Nina tried not to listen, but it was impossible. Jason had betrayed her. She remembered his voice on the tape, cold and calculating. She felt her anger coming back, and it was a relief, something to hold on to.

“Why did you think I could be useful and not him?” she asked, doing her best to hold her voice steady.