The FBI escort made his delivery to the Hay-Adams lobby. Chancellor was the package. He was signed for by a nod and a corresponding “Okay.… Good night,” spoken politely by the man from the Central Intelligence Agency.
In the elevator Peter tried to make conversation with this stranger who had volunteered to protect him. “My name’s Chancellor,” he said foolishly.
“I know,” replied the man. “.I read your book. You did quite a job on us.”
It was not the most reassuring of greetings. “It wasn’t meant that way. I have several friends in the CIA.”
“Want to bet?”
Not reassuring at all. “There’s a man named Bromley flying in from Indianapolis.”
“We know. He’s sixty-five years old and in poor health. He had a weapon on him at the Indie airport. He has a permit, so it’s supposed to be returned to him at the National terminal, but it won’t be. It’ll be lost.”
“He could pick up another.”
“Not likely. O’Brien put a man on him.”
They reached the floor; the elevator door opened. The CIA man blocked Peter’s exit with his arm and walked out first, his right hand in his overcoat pocket. He glanced up and down the corridor, turned, and nodded to Chancellor.
“What about the morning?” asked Peter, coming out of the elevator. “Bromley could walk into any gun store—”
“With an Indianapolis permit? No retailer would sell him a firearm.”
“Some would. There are ways.”
“There are better ways to prevent it.”
They were at the door of the suite. The CIA man removed his right hand from his coat pocket; he held a small automatic. With his left he undid the two middle buttons of his overcoat and shoved the weapon out of sight. Peter knocked.
He could hear Alison’s racing footsteps. She opened the door and moved to embrace him, stopping at the sight of the stranger. “Alison, this is—I’m sorry, I don’t know your name.”
“Tonight I don’t have one,” the CIA man said, nodding to Alison. “Good evening, Miss MacAndrew.”
“Hello?” Alison was understandably bewildered. “Please come in.”
“No, thank you.” The agent looked at Chancellor. “I’ll be right out here in the corridor at all times. My relief comes on at eight in the morning, which means I’ll have to wake you up so you know who he is.”
“I’ll be up.”
“Fine. Good night.”
“Wait a minute.…” An idea struck Peter. “If Bromley shows up, and you’re sure he’s not armed, maybe I should talk to him. I don’t know him. I don’t know why he’s after me.”
“That’s up to you. Let’s play it as it comes.” He closed the door.
“You were gone so long!” Alison threw her arms around him, her face next to his. “I nearly went out of my mind!”
He held her gently. “That’s finished with. Nobody’s going out of his mind. Not any more.”
“You told them everything?”
“Yes.” He moved her back so he could look at her face. “Everything. About your father, too. I had to. The man I talked with knew I was holding back. He made it clear that they could trace every move we made. They wouldn’t have to go very far; just across the river to the Pentagon.”
She nodded and took his arm, leading him away from the door into the sitting room. “How do you feel?”
“Fine. Relieved. How about a drink?”
“My man’s been working. I’ll make them,” she said, heading for the bar stocked by the hotel’s room service. Peter fell into an armchair, his body limp, his feet stretched out. “I’ve been meaning to ask you,” said Alison, pouring whisky and opening the ice bucket “Do you always have a bar set up for you wherever you go? You don’t drink that much.”
“A few months ago I drank that much.” Chancellor laughed; it was good to remember, knowing things had changed, he thought. “To answer your question, it’s an indulgence that came with the first large advance. I remembered all those movies. Writers in hotel rooms always had fancy bars and wore smoking jackets. I don’t have a smoking jacket.”
It was Alison’s turn to laugh. She brought his drink to him and sat in the chair opposite his. “I’ll buy you one for Christmas.”
“Next Christmas,” he said, holding her eyes. “This Christmas give me a plain gold ring. It’ll go on the third finger of my left hand. Just as yours will.”
Alison drank from her glass and glanced away. “I meant what I said a few hours ago. I don’t require any commitments.”
Chancellor looked at her, alarmed. He put his drink down and went to her. He knelt by her side and touched her face. “What am I supposed to say? Thank you, Miss MacAndrew, it’s been a nice interlude’? I won’t say it, and I can’t think it. I don’t think you can, either.”
She stared at him, her eyes vulnerable. “There’s a great deal you don’t know about me.”
Peter smiled. “What? You’re the daughter of the regiment? The whore of battalion twelve? Virgin you’re not, but the other doesn’t fit, either. You’re not the type. You’re too damned independent.”
“You make judgments too quickly.”
“Good! I’m glad you think so. I’m very decisive, a quality that’s been noticeably absent for a long time … before I met you.”
“You were recovering from a very painful experience. I was here. And in trouble of my own.”
“Thank you, Madame Freud. But you see, I am recovered, and I am decisive. Try this decision out. I realize marriage isn’t in fashion this year, it’s so middle class.” He moved closer to her. “But you see, I meant what I said before, too. I do require a commitment. I believe in marriage, and I want to live with you for the rest of my life.”
Her eyes filled with tears. She shook her head and held his face. “Oh, Peter. Where were you for so many years?”
“In a different life.”
“So was I. What’s that silly poem? ‘Come live with me and be my love.…’ ”
“Marlowe. Not so silly.”
“And I’ll come live with you, Peter. And be your love. For as long as it makes sense for both of us. But I won’t marry you.”
He moved back, again alarmed. “I want more than that.”
“I can’t give you any more. I’m sorry.”
“I know you can! I feel it! So completely, so much like—” He stopped.
“Like her? Like your Cathy?”
“Yes! I can’t bury that.”
“I’d never want you to bury it. Maybe we can have something just as beautiful. But not marriage.”
“Why?”
Tears rolled down her cheeks. “Because marriage means—I won’t have children, Peter.”
She was saying something obliquely, and Chancellor knew it. He was just not sure what it was. “You’re jumping ahead. I hadn’t thought one way or the other about—” Suddenly it was clear to him. “It’s your mother. Her madness.”
Alison closed her eyes, her face streaked with tears. “My darling, try to understand.”
Peter did not move; he remained at her side and forced her to look at him. “Listen to me. I understand something else, too. You never believed what they told you, what your father told you. That your mother’s illness came about because she nearly drowned. You never accepted that. Why not?”
The look in her eyes was pathetic. “I couldn’t be sure. I’m not sure why. That’s the awful, awful thing.”
“Why couldn’t you be sure? Why would your father lie to you?”
“I don’t know! I knew him so well, every inflection of his voice, every gesture. He must have told me the story fifty times, always compulsively, as if he wanted me to love her as he once loved her. But there was always something false, something missing. Finally I understood. She was simply a crazy woman. She had grown insane naturally. Naturally. And he never wanted me to know. Do you understand now?”
Chancellor reached for her hand. “He could have been hiding something else from you.”
“What? Why would—?”
The telephone rang. Peter looked at his watch. It was past three in the morning. Who the hell would call him now? It had to be O’Brien. He picked up the phone.
“You think you’ve stopped me, but you haven’t!” The voice on the line was strident, the breathing heavy.
“Bromley?”
“You animal. You rotten, filthy scum!” Age was in the voice now. The hysterical voice belonged to an old man.
“Bromley, who are you? What have I ever done to you? I’ve never met you before in my life!”
“That wasn’t necessary, was it? You don’t have to know a person to destroy him. Or her. Destroy a child! And her children!”
Phyllis Maxwell had used the same word! Destroy. Did Bromley mean Phyllis? Was he talking about her? It couldn’t be; she had no children.
“I swear I don’t know what you’re talking about. Somebody’s lied to you. They’ve lied to others.”
“No one lied. They read it to me! You dug out the court transcripts, the confidential transcripts, the psychiatric reports. You wrote it all down, every filthy thing! You used our names, where we live, where she lives!”
“None of that’s true! I haven’t used any court transcripts or psychiatric reports! There’s nothing like that in the manuscript! I haven’t the vaguest idea what it all means!”
“Scum. Liar.” The old man drew out his words in hatred. “Do you think I’m a fool? Do you think they didn’t give me proof? I’ve been responsible for printing thousands of audits.” The voice exploded. “They gave me a number and I checked that number and I called that number! Bedford Printers! I spoke with the typographer. He read me what you’d written! What he’d set in type a week ago!”
Peter was stunned. Bedford was the printing house his publisher used for its books. “That’s impossible! The manuscript’s not with Bedford. It couldn’t be. It’s nowhere near finished!”
There was a momentary silence. Chancellor could only hope he was getting through to the old man. But Bromley’s next words told him he was not.
“You go to such lengths to lie! The publication date is set for April. Your publication date’s always April.”
“Not this year.”
“Your book’s printed. And I don’t care anymore. You weren’t satisfied destroying me. Now you go after her. But I’ll stop you, Chancellor. You can’t hide from me. I’ll find you, and I’ll kill you. Because I don’t care. My life is over.”
Peter thought quickly. “Listen to me! What’s happened to you has happened to others. Let me ask you. Did someone call you, whisper over the telephone? A high-pitched whisper—?”
The phone went dead. Chancellor looked at it and then turned to Alison, her face still damp with tears. “He’s insane.”
“It’s the season for it.”
“I won’t listen to that,” he said, reaching into his pocket for the page of notepaper with O’Brien’s number on it He dialed. “It’s Chancellor. Bromley called me. He’s desperate. He thinks my book’s coming out in April. Like Phyllis Maxwell, he’s convinced there’s damaging information in it.”
“Is there?” asked O’Brien.
“No. I’ve never heard of him before in my life.”
“I’m surprised. He’s the GSA accountant who took on the Defense Department over the C-forty cargo plane. He said there was collusion in the overruns.”
“I remember.…” Peter’s mind raced back, picturing the newspaper stories. “There were Senate hearings. He was a pretty lonely guy, if I recall. The super-patriots painted him pale red and into a corner.”
“That’s the one. His code name over here was Viper.”
“It would be. What happened to him?”
“They removed him from ‘sensitive’ audits—that’s what they called it. Then some damned fool at GSA tried to make points with the administration and withheld a rating. He instituted a civil suit.”
“And?”
“We don’t know. The suit was dropped and he disappeared.”
“But we do know, don’t we?” said Chancellor. “He received a telephone call with a high-pitched whisper on the other end of the line. And he just received another. With enough scraps of accurate information to convince him he was hearing the truth.”
“Easy. He can’t touch you. Whatever he thinks you did to him—”
“Not him,” interrupted Peter. “He talked about ‘her,’ ‘a child,’ ‘her children.’ ”
O’Brien paused. Chancellor knew what the FBI man was thinking: I’ve got a wife and family.
Alexander Meredith.
“I’ll try to find out,” said the agent finally. “He’s checked into a hotel downtown. I’ve got him under surveillance.”
“Does your man know why? Couldn’t he be—?”
“Of course not,” interrupted Quinn. “Code Viper was enough. The fact that a weapon was picked up on him in Indianapolis was more than enough. He’s immobilized. Get some sleep.”
“O’Brien?”
“What?”
“Tell me something. Why him? Why a sick old man?”
Again the agent paused before answering. When he spoke, a cold pain formed in Peter’s stomach. “Old men move around freely. Very few people stop them or suspect them; not much importance is accorded them. My guess is that an old man who’s desperate could be programed into a killer.”
“Because he doesn’t care anymore?”
“That’s part of it, I imagine. Don’t worry. He won’t get near you.”
Chancellor hung up. He needed sleep. There were many things to think about, but he was incapable of thinking. The strain of the night had caught up with him; the pills had worn off.
He could sense Alison watching him, waiting for him to say something. He turned and their eyes met. Deliberately, he walked over to her, with each step more sure of himself. He spoke calmly, with deep concern.
“I’ll accept whatever conditions you want to make, whatever way of living you choose, as long as we can be together. I don’t ever want to lose you. But there’s one condition I insist on. I’m not going to let you torment yourself over something that may not exist. I think something happened to your mother to drive her mad. I’ve never heard of a person normal one minute and mentally wasted the next unless he or she was pushed. I want to find out what happened. It may be painful, but I think you’ve got to know. Will you accept my condition?” Peter held his breath.
Alison nodded. A half smile appeared on her face. “Maybe we both have to know.”
“Good.” Peter resumed breathing. “Now the decision’s made, I don’t want to talk about it for a while. We don’t have to; we’ve got all the time in the world. As a matter of fact, I don’t want to talk about anything vaguely unpleasant for days.”
Alison remained in the chair, looking up at him. “Is your novel unpleasant?”
“The blackest. Why?”
“Are you going to stop writing it?”
He paused. It was odd, but once he’d made the decision, actually gone to the bureau and told his story, the pressure had been lifted, and his mind was clearer. The professional in him was emerging again. “It’ll be a different book. I’ll take out people, put in new ones, change the circumstances. But I’ll keep a lot, too.”
“Can you do that?”
“It’ll happen. The premise is still strong. I’ll find a way. I’ll go slowly for a while; it’ll come to me.”
Alison smiled. “I’m glad.”
“That’s the last decision for the night. Anyway, I want to go back to the first one.”
“Which is?”
He smiled. “You. Come live with me and be my love.”
He heard rapid tapping through the mists of sleep. Alison stirred beside him, burying her head deeper into her pillow. He slid out of the bed and grabbed his trousers from the chair where he had draped them. Naked, he walked into the sitting room, closing the bedroom door behind him. Awkwardly pulling on his trousers, he hopped toward the foyer.
“Who is it?” he asked.
“It’s eight o’clock,” said the voice of the CIA man beyond the door.
Peter remembered. At eight o’clock the guard changed; it was time for identifications, his and the new sentry’s.
And it was all he could do to conceal his shock. He blinked and stifled a yawn and rubbed his eyes to further hide his astonishment. The new man was the CIA “domestic” who had given Peter material for Counterstrike! Given it freely. In anger. Deeply concerned over the illegalities the agency was forced to perpetrate.
“Names aren’t necessary,” said the agent initially assigned to Chancellor. “He’ll take over for me.”
Peter nodded. “Okay. No names, no handshakes. I wouldn’t want you to catch anything.”
“What you’ve got jumps,” said the second man quietly, with an offensive tone worthy of his companion. He turned to the first agent. “He stays in the hotel, right?”
“That’s what we’ve agreed to. No outside work.”
Both men turned, dismissing him, and walked toward the elevators. Peter went inside and closed the door. He listened for the faint sounds of the elevator. When they came, he waited an additional ten seconds before he opened the door.
The CIA man slid past Chancellor into the small foyer of the suite. Peter closed the door. “Christ!” said the agent. “I nearly had a cardiac arrest when I got the call last night.”
“You? I damned near fell over when I saw you standing there!”
“You carried it off. Sorry. I couldn’t take the chance of phoning you.”
“How did it happen?”
“O’Brien. He’s one of our contacts at the bureau. When Hoover shut down communications, O’Brien and several others worked with us, got us information we had to have. It wouldn’t make sense for him to call anyone else; they’d probably refuse him. He knew we wouldn’t”
“You owed him,” said Chancellor.
“More than you can realize. O’Brien and his friends put their necks as well as their careers on the line for us. If they’d ever been found out, Hoover would have gone berserk. He’d have made sure they were sent to some choice prisons for ten to twenty years apiece.”
Peter winced. “He could do that, couldn’t he?”
“Could and did. There are several unadvertised carcasses rotting away in Mississippi cells even now. It was his last Siberia. O’Brien’s owed; we can’t forget that.”
“But Hoover’s dead.”
“Maybe somebody’s trying to bring him back. Isn’t that what this is all about? Why else would O’Brien call us in?”
Chancellor wondered. It was as valid a possibility as he had heard. O’Brien spoke of the Hoover group—some known, others not, none to be trusted. Did they have Hoover’s files? Were they trying to regain control of the bureau? If so, men like Quinn O’Brien had to be destroyed for that control to be taken. “You could be right,” he said.
The man nodded. “It starts all over again. Not that it’s ever really stopped. When I heard your name last night, I wondered what had taken you so long.”
“What does that mean?” Peter was confused.
“The information I gave you. You used it pretty exclusively against us. Why? There were a lot of people at fault, not just us.”
“I’ll say now what I said two years ago. The agency used the failings of other people as an excuse. Too damned quickly and with too much enthusiasm. I thought we’d agreed. I thought that’s why you gave me the information.”
The man shook his head. “I guess I thought you’d spread the guilt around a little more. Then I figured you were saving it for another book. That is what this is all about, isn’t it? You’re writing a book about the bureau.”
Chancellor was stunned. “Where did you hear that?”
“I didn’t hear it, I read it. In this morning’s paper. Phyllis Maxwell’s column.”