Murder in the CIA (11 page)

“I am … I just … sometimes I become frightened when Dr. Wayman brings other people into it.”

Tolker laughed. It was a reassuring laugh. He said, “I’d think you’d find that comforting, Harriet. You’re certainly not alone. There are thousands of people involved, every one of them like you, bright, dedicated,
good
people.”

Tolker saw a small smile form on her face. She said, “I really don’t need a speech, Dr.… what was your name?” Her voice was arrogant, unfriendly, nothing like the sweet quality it had when they’d been introduced.

“Dr. James. Richard James.” He said to Wayman, “I’d like to see the tests, Bill.”

“All right.” Wayman placed his hand on Harriet’s hand, which was on the arm of her chair. He said, “Ready, Harriet?”

“As ready as I’ll ever be,” she said in a voice that seemed to come from another person. “It’s showtime, Dr. J-a-m-e-s.”

Wayman glanced up at Tolker, then said to her in a soothing voice, “Harriet, I want you to roll your eyes up to the top of your head, as far as you can.” He placed his forefinger on her brow and said, “Look up, Harriet.” Tolker leaned forward and peered into her eyes. Wayman said, “That’s
right, Harriet, as far as you can.” Her pupils disappeared, leaving only two milky white sockets.

Tolker nodded at Wayman and smiled.

Wayman said, “Now, Harriet, I want you to keep your eyes where they are and slowly lower your eyelids. That’s it … very slowly … there you are. You feel very relaxed now, don’t you?” She nodded. “Now, Harriet, your arm, the one I’m touching, feels light, buoyant, as though a dozen helium-filled balloons were attached to it. Let it rise, let it float up. That’s it, that’s wonderful.” Her arm drifted into the air and hung there as though suspended by an invisible wire.

Wayman turned to Tolker and said, “She’s a perfect ‘five,’ the best I’ve ever seen.”

Tolker grunted and leaned close to her face. “This is Dr. James, Harriet. How do you feel?”

“I feel good.”

“I have something I want to ask you to do.”

“I … I won’t.”

Wayman said, “She responds only to me. What do you want her to do?”

“Learn a phrase, and be told I’m the one she’s to repeat it to.”

“All right. Harriet, I want you to remember what I’m about to say to you. You’ll never repeat it to anyone else except someone who says to you, ‘The fog is thick.’ All right?”

“Yes,” she said in a dreamy voice.

“I want you to remember, ‘There are four people. Two of them are good, and two of them are bad. The bad ones are Bill and Sally.’ Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

“When I tell you to come out of the pleasant, relaxed state you’re enjoying now, you’ll remember that phrase and only repeat it to someone who says, ‘The fog is thick.’ ”

“Yes.”

“I’m going to count backwards from five to one. When I reach one, you’ll open your eyes and feel very good, very relaxed. Ready?”

“Yes.”

“Five—four—three—two—one.”

She blinked open her eyes and a placid smile crossed her face.

“Feel good?” Wayman asked.

“Yes. I feel good.”

“You look very relaxed, at peace,” Tolker said.

“Who are you?” she asked.

Tolker laughed. “You know who I am. I was introduced to you only a few minutes ago.”

“Yes, I remember. You’re Dr. James.”

“That’s right. I was wondering, Harriet, about the four people we’ve been discussing.”

She looked at Wayman and frowned.

“You know who I mean,” Tolker said, “the four people we’re concerned about. We want to know which ones we can trust and which ones we can’t trust.”

“I don’t understand,” she said.

“Of course you don’t,” Wayman said. He looked at Tolker and said, “Go ahead.”

Tolker said to her, “Harriet, the fog is thick.”

She closed her eyes, opened them, and blinked rapidly.

“Did you hear me, Harriet? I said the fog is thick.”

Her eyes continued to flutter. They rolled up in her head, and her arm began to tremble. She said in a halting, tentative voice, “There are … four people. Some of them are good and … two of them are bad. The bad ones are … Bill … and … Sally.”

“Excellent,” Wayman said. He sat back and looked to Tolker for approval. Tolker returned to the desk and resumed his seat on its edge.

Wayman said to Harriet, “That was very good, Harriet. You’re not in your relaxed state anymore. You can open your eyes now. You’ve done a very good job.”

Tolker watched her come out of her hypnotic state. She shook her head and rubbed her eyes.

“What do you remember?” Wayman asked her.

“I remember … I was feeling very good. Is there something else I should remember,
Doctor
?” It was the same angry, scornful voice she’d used earlier.

“No,” Wayman said. He stood and held out his hand to
her. “Why don’t you wait in the other room. I won’t be long. I just want to talk to my colleague for a few moments.”

She got up and ran her hands over the front of her dress. Tolker observed that she was attractive, a little overweight but with a frank sensuality she was used to displaying. She watched him, openly inviting him as she crossed the room, opened a door, and went out.

“Impressed?” Wayman said. He’d gone to his chair behind the desk and lighted a cigarette.

“Yes. She’s good. I’m not sure she’s a five, though.”

“I test her that way,” said Wayman.

“I’d have to look again. Her upgaze is, but the eye roll might not be.”

“Does it really matter?” Wayman asked, not bothering to mask the amusement in his voice. “This search for the perfect five is probably folly, Jason.”

“I don’t think so. How long have you been working with her?”

Wayman shrugged. “Six months, eight months. She’s a prostitute, or was, a good one, highly paid.”

“A call girl.”

“That is more genteel. We came across her by accident. One of the contacts arranged for her to bring men to the safehouse. I watched a few of the sessions and realized that what I was seeing in
her
was far more interesting than the way the men were behaving under drugs. I mentioned it to the contact and the next time she was up, we were introduced. I started working with her the next day.”

“She was that willing?”

“She’s bright, enjoys the attention.”

“And the money?”

“We’re paying her fairly.”

Tolker laughed. “Is this the first time she’s been put to the test?”

It was Wayman’s turn to laugh. “For heaven’s sake, no. I’d started planting messages with her and testing the recall process within the first month. She’s never failed.”

“I’ll have to see more.”

“Tonight?”

“No.” Tolker walked to a window that was covered by
heavy beige drapes. He touched the fabric, turned, and said, “There’s something wrong with using a hooker, Bill.”

“Why?”

“Hookers are … Christ, one thing they’re
not
is trustworthy.”

Wayman came up behind and patted him on the back. “Jason, if one’s basic morality were a criterion for choosing subjects in this project, we’d all have abandoned it years ago. In fact, we’d all have been ruled out ourselves.”

“Speak for yourself, Bill.”

“Whatever you say. Shall I continue with her?”

“I suppose so. See how far you can take her.”

“I’ll do that. By the way, I was sorry to hear about Miss Mayer.”

“I’d rather not discuss it.”

“Fine, except it must rank as a loss, Jason. If I understood you correctly the last time we met at Langley, she represented one of your best cases.”

“She was all right, a solid four, nothing special.”

“I thought she was …”

“Just a solid four, Bill. I couldn’t use her to carry mentally. She worked out as a bag carrier.”

“Just that?”

Tolker glared at him. “Yes, just that. Anything else for me to see while I’m out here?”

“No. I have a young man in therapy who shows potential, but I haven’t made up my mind yet.”

Wayman showed Tolker out of the building and to his car. “You drive her home?” Tolker asked.

“Yes.”

“She live in San Fran?”

“Yes.”

“She still turn tricks?”

“Only for us. We have a session set up for tomorrow night. Care to join us?”

“Maybe I will. Same place?”

“Yes. Good night, Jason.”

“Good night, Bill.”

Dr. William Wayman closed the door behind him and muttered “Slime” as he climbed the stairs.

Tolker returned to the city, called his wife from the room at the Hopkins, had a brief conversation. Their marriage had deteriorated to an accommodation years ago. He called another number. A half hour later a young Oriental girl wearing a silk dress the color of tangerines knocked at the door. He greeted her, said, “It’s been too long,” and sprawled on the bed as she went into the bathroom. When she returned, she was nude. She carried a small plastic bag of white powder, which she placed on the bed next to him. He grinned and absently ran his hand over her small breast.

“I brought the best,” she said.

“You always do,” he said as he rolled off the bed and started to undress.

At eleven o’clock the next night Jason Tolker stood with Dr. William Wayman and two other men in a small apartment. A video camera was positioned against an opening through the wall into the adjoining apartment. A small speaker carried audio from the other apartment.

“Here we go,” one of them said, as what had been a static picture of the next room on the monitor suddenly came to life. The door to the next room opened. Harriet, the woman from Wayman’s office the night before, led a rotund man through the door. She closed and locked it, turned, and started to undo his tie. He was drunk. A large belly hung over the front of his pants, and his suit jacket was visibly wrinkled even in the room’s dim light.

“Drink?” she asked.

“No, I …”

“Oh, come on, join me in a drink. It gets me in the mood.”

She returned from the kitchen with two glasses.

“What’s she using?” Tolker asked.

“That new synthetic from Bethesda,” Wayman said.

It turned out to be a wasted evening, at least scientifically. The man Harriet had brought to the apartment was too drunk to be a valid subject, the effects of the drug she’d placed in his drink compromised by the booze. He was too drunk even to have sex with her, and fell asleep soon after they’d climbed into bed, the sound of his snoring rasping
from the speakers. The men in the next room continued to watch, however, while Harriet pranced about the room. She examined her full body in a mirror, and even hammed for the camera after a cautious glance at the sleeping subject.

“Disgusting,” Tolker muttered as he prepared to leave.

“Harriet?” Wayman asked.

“The fat slob. Tell her to pick better quality next time.” He returned to the hotel and watched Randolph Scott in a western on TV before falling asleep.

VIRGINIA, TWO DAYS LATER

It was good to be home.

Collette Cahill had slept off her jet lag in the room that had been hers as she grew up. Now she sat in the kitchen with her mother and helped prepare for a party in her honor that night, not a big affair, just neighbors and friends in for food and drinks to welcome her back.

Mrs. Cahill, a trim and energetic woman, had gone to an imported food store and bought things she felt represented Hungarian fare. “That’s all I eat now, Mom,” Collette had said. “We get a lot of Hungarian food.”

To which her mother replied, “But we don’t. It’s a good excuse. I’ve never had goulash.”

“You still won’t have had it, Mom. In Hungary, goulash is a soup, not a stew.”

“Pardon me,” her mother said. They laughed and embraced and Collette knew nothing had changed, and was thankful for it.

Guests began to arrive at seven. There was a succession of gleeful greetings at the door: “I can’t believe it.” “My
God, it’s been ages!” “You look wonderful.” “Great to see you again.” One of the last guests to arrive was, to Collette’s surprise, her high school beau, Vern Wheatley. They’d been “a number” in high school, had dated right through graduation when they promptly went their separate ways, Collette staying in the area to attend college, Wheatley to the University of Missouri to major in journalism.

“This is … this is too much,” Cahill said as she opened the door and stared at him. Her first thought was that he’d grown more handsome over the years, but then she reminded herself that every man got better-looking after high school. His sandy hair had receded only slightly, and he wore it longer than in his yearbook photo. He’d always been slender, but now he was sinewy slim. He wore a tan safari jacket over a blue button-down shirt, jeans, and sneakers.

“Hi,” he said. “Remember me?”

“Vern Wheatley, what are you doing here? How did you …?”

“Came down to Washington on assignment, called your mom, and she told me about this blast. Couldn’t resist.”

“This is …” She hugged him and led him to the living room where everyone was gathered. After introductions, Collette led him to the bar where he poured himself a glass of Scotch. “Collette,” he said, “you look sensational. Budapest must be palatable.”

“Yes, it is. I’ve had a very enjoyable assignment there.”

“Is it over? You’re coming back here?”

“No, just a leave.”

He grinned. “You take leaves, I take vacations.”

“What are you doing these days?”

“I’m an editor, at least for the moment.
Esquire
. It’s my fifth … no, seventh job since college. Journalists have never been known for stability, have we?”

“Judging from you, I guess not.”

“I do some free-lancing, too.”

“I’ve read some of your pieces.” He gave her a skeptical look. “No, I really have, Vern. You had that cover story in the
Times
magazine section on …”

“On the private aviation lobby helping to keep our skies unsafe.”

“Right. I really did read it. I said to myself, ‘I know him.’ ”

“When.”

“Huh?”

“I knew him when. I’m still in my when stage.”

“Oh. Do you like New York?”

“Love it, although I can think of other places I’d rather live.” He sighed. “It’s been a while.”