Atropos (21 page)

“Don’t make me laugh.”

“Hey,
it’s your
government I’m working for, according to you. I could be engaged in a project that could save millions of lives, bring world peace, if only I got a chance to finish the job. Wouldn’t that give you second thoughts about blowing the whistle? Could I appeal to your patriotism at all?”

“I’m a reporter, Trotter. I have a job to do. I’m bending my ethics enough just offering to let you skip town. I should have phoned you for a comment, then plastered your face across the front page of this afternoon’s papers.”

“Even if it would have ruined months, maybe years, of delicate maneuvering and secret negotiations? Even if lives would be lost and a chance to increase your country’s security is ruined?”

“I do my job, Trotter. Don’t try to snow me.”

“Okay, let me see if I’ve got you straight. A reporter has a job to do; he has to print what he thinks he’s found out, no matter what.”

“Don’t you know that? Aren’t you supposed to be a reporter?”

“We’re pretending I’m a spy, remember? So he prints what he knows, no matter what. Unless, of course, he has some personal ax to grind, the way you do, then he uses the information for blackmail. Right?”

Murphy wanted to shout indignant denials, but honesty compelled him to admit to himself that that was exactly what he was doing. He could argue he was doing it for the good of someone he loved, but that wouldn’t carry a lot of weight, since he’d already scoffed at the idea of Trotter’s doing what he did for his country.

“Go on,” Murphy said.

Trotter nodded. “Our ideal reporter, then, just does his job. He does what he’s been trained to do, what he’s promised his employers he’ll do.”

“That’s right.”

“He doesn’t give a shit who gets hurt.”

“No, he doesn’t.”

“Then what’s the difference between you and me, friend? Why the hell should
I
give a shit about Regina, or you, or anybody else?”

Trotter was leaning off the couch now. His eyes shot flames. Murphy could smell Trotter’s sweat, a feral smell.
The last thing the rabbit knows,
Murphy thought,
is the breath of the wolf.

Trotter closed his eyes and let out his own breath in a whoosh. He leaned back, took a sip of his drink, and opened his eyes again.

“Let’s take it from another angle. If I didn’t like you, I’d just let you publish the stuff and be done with it.
You’d
have to leave town.”

“Don’t be an ass.” Murphy had been afraid his voice would crack; he was proud of himself that it hadn’t.

“You’d be a laughingstock. Look, you checked me out, Allan Trotter. Everything you were able to find supported the idea that I’m who I say I am. Now you say that Clifford Driscoll isn’t dead, that I’m Clifford Driscoll. Okay, you dig him up, you compare dental records, fingerprints, whatever. How much would you like to bet everything you check supports my version of things? And makes you look like an idiot?”

Murphy clutched his envelope tight. He’d put it together believing his salvation was inside it. He couldn’t let go of it now, no matter what Trotter said.

Trotter was far from through. “You say I’m a spy, but you’ll never find a nickel paid to me on any government payroll ever. An agency you can’t even get a sniff of? Who’s going to buy it?

“Oh, you’re right about one thing. Nothing would ever happen to you. If you were to have an accident, conspiracy nuts might begin to take you seriously. On the other hand, if you go ahead with this, everybody will take it as the pathetic spleen of a lovesick drunk.”

Murphy stared at him. The envelope slipped from his fingers. He had come here this afternoon fighting the fear that Trotter would kill him. Now he almost wished he would.

“No,” Trotter said. “Wait a minute. Sean. I know that look in your eye.

Don’t go planning any of your own accidents to lend yourself credibility, okay?”

“It never crossed my mind,” Murphy lied. “But why not?”

“Because there’s something else you didn’t think of. Or wouldn’t let yourself believe if you did.”

“What’s that?”

“That whoever or whatever I am, I truly do love Regina Hudson. That whatever there is to know about me, she’s known since before I went off the catwalk.”

“But ... but ...”

“You’re shocked that she hasn’t printed it.” Trotter shrugged. “From the publisher’s chair, maybe journalism is a little more complicated. Or maybe Regina can just see around the edges of it a little bit better.”

“You’re lying to me.”

“Well,” Trotter said, then smiled. “Reagan again. We’re just supposing here, remember. For now. Unless you’re wired. I’ll tell you what. You talk to Regina. I’ll tell her to limit what she tells you only by her trust for you. From what she says about you, that’s a pretty loose limit.”

Murphy didn’t believe it. He didn’t dare believe it. But he was damned if he could figure out what the trick was.

“When is this supposed to happen?”

“Today. Now. I’ll call Regina right away.” Trotter reached for the phone. He paused with his hand on the receiver. “Oh,” he said. “Just one thing.”

“I knew there was a catch.”

“If
you
in your nosy amateur way do anything to put Regina in danger, I’ll kill you.”

“Pretty aggressive talk for a reporter.”

“If you put the woman I love in danger, I’d kill you if I were a soda jerk. Still want me to make that call?”

“Make it.”

But he never did. Just then, the phone rang. Trotter brought it to his ear and said hello. “No, as a matter of fact, I had my hand on the phone.” He said yes a few times, then he said “Jesus.” He said he wasn’t alone and couldn’t go into details. He said he’d be down there by tonight. He hung up the phone.

To Murphy, he said, “You’ve got to leave now.”

“What about the call to Regina?”

“When I get the chance. Tonight, probably.”

Trotter was on his feet, somehow propelling Murphy toward the door.

“I know a stall when I hear one, Trotter.”

Trotter rolled his eyes in exasperation. “To hell with you then. I’ve got no time to go easy on you. Publish whatever you goddam want.”

The door slammed behind him. Murphy was out on the front walk. He didn’t have his envelope. He thought of knocking on the door and asking for it, but he’d used up all the courage he could muster for one afternoon.

He wondered if he’d accomplished anything this afternoon. He wondered what he was going to do now.

And, as he had from the moment he’d met the man, he wondered what the hell Trotter was up to. r

“S
ENATOR, HAVE YOU HEARD
from the kidnappers?”

“Senator, do you have any indication that your son is still unharmed?”

“Was your son involved with Miss Fraser, Senator?”

“Senator, how about speculation that—”

“Senator, is it true that—”

“Senator, would you say—”

“Senator—”

“Senator—”

They were going to get their shot at him sooner or later; Hank had agreed with Ainley that it would be wisest to get it over with right away. Hank knew from experience that if a thing like this happened, the smart move was to get the press on your side as soon as possible. Of course, sometimes, as in the Pina thing, you couldn’t actually get them over to your side, the best you could do was to keep them from being mad at you for not cooperating with them. Something else Hank had learned over the years—the one thing the press can’t ever forgive is your trying to ignore them. They didn’t like that. They needed the constant reassurance that they were as important as they thought they were.

This would be simple compared to the Pina thing, since Hank was absolutely innocent. He didn’t know a damn thing more than these vulture reporters did.

Yesterday morning, the maid had shown up at Helen Fraser’s apartment to find the Fraser kid lying on the floor with a hole from a 9-millimeter automatic between her eyes, wearing her overcoat, and surrounded by the contents of a bag of groceries she’d been carrying when she entered. She hadn’t been raped.

Mark’s fingerprints were all over the place. People pretended to be surprised, but Hank knew that for the hypocrisy it was. For one thing, everyone in Washington who counted had seen them together, and for another, if Mark had been spending time in the company of a girl that good-looking without collecting her scalp, the boy wouldn’t be much of a Van Horn. And everybody who counted knew that, too.

Mark’s car had been found parked nearby, which helped scotch the nasty rumors that Mark had done for the girl himself, and arranged for his own disappearance. People had such nasty minds. Hank had found that out for himself. Here the poor kid’s girlfriend had been killed for some reason, and he’s been kidnapped, and there are some people who’ll probably never believe it wasn’t a put-up job.

Although, Hank had to admit, if the kidnapping business
had
been a ploy, the kid’s not taking off in his own car had been a really smart move. Hank had wanted to discuss it with Ainley, but Ainley wasn’t in a discussing mood. All he could talk about was the danger to Mark, my God, we have to get Mark back.

Well, of
course
they had to get Mark back. The sooner the better, too. This was going to mess up the Presidential campaign the way things were going. Take the country’s attention away from Senator Van Horn’s forthcoming (one of these days) Presidential endorsement, and put it back on the continuing soap opera the public seemed to love to make of the Van Horn family.

And they had to get Mark out of danger, too. He didn’t need an adviser to tell him
that.
He was the boy’s father. Ainley wasn’t.

Things were a little better once the kidnappers got in touch with Hank, since the FBI had been monitoring the phone, and they vouched for the message’s being genuine.

The message hadn’t said much—your son is unharmed, you will hear from us again. The voice was clear and unaccented, and didn’t sound like anyone Hank or Ainley knew. The FBI had said they’d play the tape for some people who got around in different circles, and Hank had said that would be fine.

In a way, it was kind of
fun
to be innocent.

Now the press was baying, so Ainley (whose nervous dithering in private didn’t seem to effect his cool, public efficiency one bit) arranged this press conference in the room the Senate keeps for such things.

As usual, they started screaming the questions the minute Hank showed his face. As usual, every time he moved his head, a new flashgun went off in his eyes. He could handle it. He’d stopped wincing at flashguns long ago—it made for bad photos in the paper.

As for the chaos of voices, he’d been trained to handle that practically since birth. Hold up a hand. Smile—in this case, a little wearily, a little sadly. Say, “One at a time, gentlemen, please.” Then call a name.

The questions were easy, nothing he wasn’t ready for. Except one, from a good-looking redhead from some paper in Texas. “Senator, have you spoken with Undersecretary Fraser since the incident?”

Hank made his face suitably grave, but inside he was smiling. He thought he might be in love with this young thing who threw such nice fat ones over the plate. He’d have to arrange for her to have a private interview with him at the earliest possible moment.

Lots of things had to be taken care of first though, like answering her question.

Hank sighed. “No,” he said sadly. “Actually, I was going to call on him as soon as we were done here, then I was going to go into seclusion while we work on getting Mark back. I know you people have your jobs to do, but can we please try to keep Al Fraser’s grief and my concern from becoming a media circus?”

The answer to that turned out to be no. It was beautiful. A media caravan followed Hank’s limo to Undersecretary Fraser’s house (fortunately, the driver knew where it was). On the way, Ainley congratulated him for handling matters so deftly.

Hank shrugged. “I just thought of what you’d want me to do.”

“What’s this about seclusion?”

“I thought it would be a good idea to get the press off my back.”

“Of course it would, but we can’t afford it now. What if the kidnappers call? What if you’ve got to do something to get Mark back?”

“I’ll be in seclusion, not incommunicado. Relax, Ainley, it’s all taken care of. Gus Pickett’s helicopter is going to pick me up and fly me to his place in Virginia. Instant worldwide communication, and protection you can’t beat anywhere.”

Ainley thought he was going to argue, but the driver’s voice came over the enunciator telling them they were at the Fraser Residence, and Hank was popping out of the car before Ainley had a chance to say anything.

Al Fraser himself opened the door. Apparently an enterprising reporter had phoned ahead to tip the Undersecretary off and to set up a better photo-op. Fraser didn’t let them down. The poor guy opened the door with his hair combed crooked and his face puffy from crying. Tears glistened in his eyes at this very moment. Hank, going with the moment, embraced him, and five thousand flashguns went off. This picture would be on every front page in the country, and the tape would run on TV for a week. You couldn’t buy that kind of coverage. You couldn’t plan it. People would see those images and see what a brave, sensitive guy Hank Van Horn was in a time of crisis. Maybe some of them would decide to forget about Pina Girolamo. Most of them would think better of him than they had, no matter where they were starting from. And in this business, good opinions translated into power. In this business, you could never have too much power.

Hank went inside, and the reporters pitched camp. Hank spent ten minutes listening to Fraser say, “Why? For God’s sake, why?” and making soothing noises, and left. The press yelled that it wanted to know what had been said. Hank looked sad and simply said, “Now, come on, folks,” in tones of gentle admonition. He got into the limo with Ainley. Ainley had apparently decided not to waste his energy trying to talk Hank out of going to Gus Pickett’s place. Ainley had always been smart.

They made it to the heliport just in time. Hank climbed in the bubble of the chopper, the pilot welcomed him and made sure he was safely buckled in, and then they took off.