18

The Attorney General heard Fargo out without interrupting him. “You did the right thing to come to me,” he announced in the famous raspy voice that came across during television interviews as honest combativeness. “I take it your lady friend didn’t tell you the name of the man in question.”

Fargo shook his head. “That’s understandable. She’s frightened.”

The Attorney General removed a tiny hearing aid from his ear and massaged the area that had been irritated by the device, then replaced it. “What did you say?” he asked.

“I didn’t say anything,” Fargo said.

“Oh, I thought you said something. About your lady friend: She has good reason to be frightened, but from what you’ve told me I don’t think she understands where the real danger lies. Her friend’s name is Silas Sibley. I have a file as thick as your fist on him. Until he failed to show up for work about ten days ago he was a member of a Central Intelligence Agency Techint team collecting serial numbers of Russian tanks in East Europe, Syria, Egypt, even the ones captured over the years by the Israelis. The object of the study was to come up with a definitive estimate of Soviet tank production capacity. This Sibley fellow was supposed to be an ace with computers. He matched the serial numbers against other information, ran the whole thing through his computer and circulated a minority report claiming that the Soviets had doctored their serial numbers to throw just such a study off track. Sibley made a case that their actual tank production was considerably less than we thought.” The Attorney General produced a gold and silver cigarette lighter, angled the flame into the bowl of his pipe and sucked it into life. “Since our antitank production line is geared to their tank production, his report stirred up quite a storm. His conclusions were double-checked by an interagency group of specialists. They decided that it was Sibley, not the Russians, who had doctored the numbers.”

The Attorney General puffed thoughtfully on his pipe, exhaled. A haze of vile-smelling smoke obscured his head. “The specialists raised the possibility that Sibley was working for the Russians. His access to documents was restricted while our people looked into this. Sibley panicked. He fired off bitter letters complaining he was being hounded for not telling the military establishment what it wanted to hear. He flatly refused to take a lie detector test on the grounds that it was notoriously inaccurate. We did manage to slip a psychiatrist onto the committee that heard him out. The result,” the Attorney General said, “was a psychiatric profile that indicated the man was stark raving mad.” The Attorney General lifted the phone and said very quietly, “Bring me the psychiatrist’s report on that Sibley fellow, will you?” He regarded Fargo through a haze of tobacco smoke. “I don’t pretend to understand all the technical jargon,” he said, “but you can get the general drift reading it yourself. Functional paranoia, delusions of persecution, delusions of grandeur, all jumbled up with a healthy death wish symbolized by an obsession with Nathan Hale. Sibley had been going around telling people he was a direct descendant of Hale’s. He said he was reconstructing the Hale story from references buried in letters and diaries, but in fact he seems to have made the whole thing up. He was inventing everything. The Hale story, plots within the government. Everywhere he turned he saw enemies. People trying to kill him. That sort of thing.”

A male secretary holding a sheet of paper came across the carpeted office. The Attorney General nodded toward Fargo. The secretary handed him the report and left. “Sibley,” the Attorney General went on, “has a particular grudge against a college roommate who wound up, like him, working for the Central Intelligence Agency. Sibley apparently thinks this roommate was responsible for the death of a girlfriend at college. I forget the roommate’s name.”

Fargo, scanning the report, said, “Wanamaker.”

“That sounds right. Wanamaker.”

Fargo looked up from the report. “Have you ever heard of an operation code-named ‘Stufftingle’?”

The Attorney General nodded slowly. “ ‘Stufftingle’ is the name of Wanamaker’s shoestring operation. He analyzes Soviet telephone directories to try and figure out the pecking order in the various Soviet ministries.”

“My lady friend,” Fargo said, “says that her friend claimed that the word Stufftingle came from a joke circulated at the Los Alamos atomic project during World War Two.”

The Attorney General shrugged. “You know as well as I do how these code names are chosen. They’re picked from lists compiled by computer, which joins together random syllables to form unintelligible words. I suppose it’s always possible that a given two- or three-syllable word has some historical significance, but if this is the case with Stufftingle it is pure coincidence.” The Attorney General pointed at the psychiatrist’s report with his pipe. “Read the next to last paragraph.”

Fargo’s eyes went back to the report. “It is imperative,” the psychiatrist had written, “that Sibley undergo extended psychiatric treatment by highly skilled professionals. Until then it must be remembered, in dealing with him, that it is vitally important to never challenge his delusions. When he is pinned down the delusions seem to multiply; he invents new stories to justify the old ones he told. If he is backed into a corner there is a strong possibility he could become violent.”

The Attorney General said, “If he had turned up for work on schedule the psychiatrist’s suggestion would have been acted on. Sibley would have been packed off to some quiet private hospital the Agency keeps for these purposes, and treated.”

Fargo laid the report on the desk. “You’re forgetting one thing,” he said. “My lady friend was with him during the third attempt on his life.”

The Attorney General sucked on his pipe without answering, and Fargo wondered if he had turned down his hearing aid. He had seen him tune out of conversations before. Raising his voice, Fargo said, “My lady friend was with him during the third attempt on his life. She witnessed it.”

“I heard you the first time,” the Attorney General snapped. “I was thinking. Assuming your lady friend got the story straight, we only have Sibley’s word for the first two attempts on his life-and you have to admit they seem like scenes out of a James Bond movie. As for the third attempt, as I understand it, your lady friend went to an abandoned building earmarked for destruction to photograph squatters. Sibley accompanied her. It was lunch hour. They parked their car in the street so as not to frighten off the squatters and went inside. They climbed the steps to the top floor. Still no squatters. Suddenly two wrecking balls began demolishing the building.” The Attorney General sucked on his pipe and exhaled again. “The demolition people came back from their lunch break, assumed the building was deserted and started working. Like most paranoiacs, Sibley fitted a piece of reality neatly into his delusions. He told your lady friend they were trying to kill him. She believed it.”

“So did I,” Fargo admitted.

“If you want to help your friend you’d better make sure Sibley gets professional assistance, and quickly. Remember what the psychiatrist said about the possibility of him becoming violent. Let’s hope your lady friend doesn’t back him into a corner.”

“Let’s hope,” Fargo agreed worriedly.

“Do you think you could talk her into setting up a meeting between you and Sibley?”

“I can try,” Fargo said.

“Be careful not to let on you have doubts about him,” the Attorney General warned.

“I’ll say I checked his story and want to help.”

“You need to meet him face to face.”

“To work out a way to stop the atrocity. To punish those responsible.”

“That’s the ticket,” the Attorney General said.