Authors: Lawrence Sanders
“For the record, doctor,” Voice No. 2 boomed from the overhead loudspeaker, “please state your name, rank, and address.”
“Name:” I said, “Flair, Nicholas Bennington. Rank: Director (Temporary) of the Satisfaction Section, Department of Bliss. Address: Room 317, Public Security Ward, Hospice No. 4, Alexandria, Virginia.”
‘‘No, no,” he said. Somewhat testily. “I mean your permanent address. Where you lived before you were taken.”
I spoke it into the air. I felt I had scored a point. He had said, “Your
permanent
address,” hadn’t he? That obviously meant my stay in the Public Security Ward would be of short duration. Confidence came flooding back. I relaxed.
I had already spent some time computing how best I might reply to prolonged questioning. Reply operatively to everything that was a matter of record. Protect, insofar as possible, friends, associates, and assistants. Pillow when I was able to, or gloss. Where I was certain no evidence existed, then deny, deny, deny. Stonewall. But in such a manner that I could not later be accused of deliberate deception. “I don’t remember,” would serve. As would, “I don’t recall,” “I have no recollection of that,” “I cannot state from personal experience,” and similar phrases.
But during the first two weeks of brief interrogative sessions, I had little need to waffle. Questioning was direct and straightforward. It was also shallow, and seemed to be antilogical. For instance: “Are you acquainted with an ef, residing in Detroit, Michigan, named Millie Jean Grunwald?”
“Yes, I am,” I said.
I naturally expected the next question, or questions, would explore the nature of my relationship with Millie. Instead, the next question was: ‘ ‘Did you know the late Simon Hawkley, an attorney of San Diego, California?”
And so it went. Short, blunt questions. Apparently designed only to put on record the fact of my acquaintance with or knowledge of a long list of objects.
Some of the names, admittedly, surprised me. Burton P. Klein. Alice Hammond. Leon Mansfield. Joanne Wilensky. Vernon DeTilly. I remembered them all. But was somewhat shaken that the Interrogator knew them.
I volunteered nothing. Absolutely nothing. But occasionally I tried to explain my relationship to the named object. Invariably, the Interrogator would interrupt, and in his orotund voice, say, “Yes, yes, we’ll get to that later.”
It took us three days to serve our way through a long list of names that apparently included every object I had had contact with since January, 1998. Several names I did not recognize. The Interrogator made no effort to prod my memory. He merely accepted my negative answer and went on to another name. Were the strangers a control group, to test my veracity?
One question I found disquieting.
“Are you acquainted with Mrs. Grace Wingate, wife of the Chief Director?” the Interrogator asked.
“Yes,” I said. “I am acquainted with Mrs. Wingate.”
He went on to another name. Louise Rawlins Tucker.
Finally, having apparently exhausted the list of objects with whom I was known, or suspected, of having had contact with during the preceding eighteen months, the Interrogator started over again. This time he probed my relationship with the objects named. How we had met, how often we met, were we users, did we have any financial dealings, etc., etc. But again, he forbore from prying too deeply. Limiting his questions to surface relationships. It was at this point in time that Voice No. 2 took on a sonorous, almost a pompous quality. Like a prosecutor designing his inquiries as much to influence a jury as to elicit information from the defendant.
Each evening, back in Room 317,1 computed the day’s interrogation. I determined what I handled well, and what badly. I tried to hypothecate future areas of inquiry. Most of all, toward the end of those initial two weeks, I attempted to analyze the Interrogator’s methodology. That he was following a heavily structured scenario, I had no doubt.
My first reaction to my taking had been, I suppose, like that of many objects in similar circumstances: It was all a horrible mistake. A file had been displaced, or a computer had been faultily programmed. An object could be executed on the testimony of one crossed circuit.
But those first two weeks of interrogation convinced me that it was, indeed,
I
who had been deliberately taken. On orders. I could not compute it. Less than a month previously I had received a letter from the Chief Director almost fulsome in its praise of my service on Operation Lewisohn. “One of the nation’s finest young creative scientists. " That is how Chief Director Michael Wingate referred to me in that letter. And now I was languishing in a Public Security Ward, charged with activities contrary to the public interest. It was incomputable.
Beginning with the third week of questioning, the Interrogator dropped his politesse. No more “Please” or “Would you. . . .’’or “Doctor” or “If you please. . . .” Inquiries became shorter, more brusque. I thought the tempo of interrogation also quickened. I scarcely had time to complete my reply before the next question was hurtling down at me. This effect, too, I presumed, was programmed. But I had little time, or inclination, to analyze technique. I was too concerned with my own defense.
“You stated you know Millie Jean Grunwald.”
“Yes, that’s correct.”
“How long have you known her?”
“Three-—no, four years.”
“How did you meet her?”
“At a cockfight.”
“In Detroit?”
“Yes.”
“Where was this cockfight held?”
“I don’t recall the address. A basement club. Somewhere down near the river.”
“You were introduced to Millie Jean Grunwald at this club?”
“No. I had won a bet, and asked her and her girlfriend to have a drink with me.”
“What was the girlfriend’s name?”
“I don’t remember. If I ever heard it. Which I—"
“What are your relations with Millie Jean Grunwald?”
“We are friends.”
“Friends? Flair, how many doctorates do you have?”
“Several.”
“Millie Jean Grunwald is a retardate clone. You are aware of that?”
“Yes.”
“But you are friends?”
“Yes.”
“Do you use her?”
“We use each other.”
“Frequently?”
‘‘Whenever I’m in Detroit. Perhaps three or four times a year. ’’
“Do you give her gifts?”
“Yes.”
“Love?”
“No.”
“Have you ever discussed restricted matters with her?”
“She wouldn’t understand, I assure you.”
“You haven’t answered my question. Did you ever discuss restricted material with Millie Jean Grunwald?”
“I don’t remember.”
“You don’t remember? Flair, you have made that claim several times. Yet you are reputed to have the best memory in the scientific community.”
“I was forced to skip my hippocampal irrigation this year, and I’m overdue on theta brushup conditioning.”
“I see.”
“Interrogator, you have made
that
claim several times. ‘I see.’ ”
“You object to it?”
“It reminds me of an object who says, ‘Let me make one thing perfectly clear. ’ Then I know I’m to be the victim of obfuscation. ’
“I see.”
As sessions lengthened, I endured similar bursts of short, blunt questions about almost every object on the Interrogator’s list. I had no opportunity to extend or explain my answers. Attempted explications were cut short. Subjects were shifted with bewildering speed and increasing frequency. Several times I found myself still speaking of the last object when a new name had been introduced. The Interrogator then snapped a command to pay closer attention to his questions.
Some objects, being stopped, I made no effort to defend. Simon Hawkley was one. Angela Teresa Berri was another. No one could touch them now.
“You and Berri were users?”
“Yes.”
“Frequently?”
“Several times.”
“Her apartment, yours, or elsewhere?”
“Her apartment, mine, and elsewhere.”
“You have stated that you suspected her of activities contrary to the public interest.”
“That’s correct.”
“Why didn’t you communicate your suspicions to her rulers?”
“To whom? I had no knowledge of how extensive her conspiracy might be. Perhaps her rulers were involved.”
“Did you think the Chief Director might be involved in her peculations?”
“Of course not.”
“Then why didn’t you go to him?”
“I—well, it didn’t occur to me. I didn’t know him personally at that point in time.”
“Our records indicate that Angela Teresa Berri introduced you to the Chief Director. Is that correct?”
“Yes.”
“So she was still animate when you met him. Personally. Why didn’t you tell him of your suspicions then?”
“Because they were only suspicions. I had no hard evidence.” “But you have stated that you knew she had assassinated Frank Lawson Harris and had manipulated the stopping of Burton P. Klein and others.”
“That’s correct. I
knew
it, but had no evidence to prove it.”
“Now about the Scilla business in San Diego. . . .”
By the end of the fourth week, I was no longer amused by the Interrogator’s increasingly bombastic voice and denunciatory tone. I was too concerned with avoiding contradictions in my testimony and attempting to convince the Interrogator that although some of my activities might have been technically illegal, my actions benefited the US Government: A conspiracy of terrorists had been exposed and a corrupt government official was stopped. I made no love from this.
“Not even from your final sale of Scilla?”
“A very minor amount, I assure you. Hardly a tenth of my income for the year. If making love was my motivation, I would have retained ownership.”
“Perhaps you became frightened.”
“That’s absurd.”
“Is it? Let’s go back to the Society of Obsoletes' conspiracy.
. . . How well did you know Dr. Thomas J. Wiley?”
“I told you, I studied with him for a brief period of time.”
“Did you like him?”
“Yes.”
“Admire his brain?”
“Well . . . yes. Not his ideas, but his brain.”
“What contact did you have with him between the time you studied with him and the time you met him at Dr. Henry Hammond’s summer home?”
“No contact.”
“None?”
“That’s correct.”
“We have in our possession a program of a symposium
held at
the University of Chicago on July 14 to 17, 1997. The guest list shows that both you and Dr. Thomas J. Wiley attended.”
“That’s possible. There were more than a hundred objects at that symposium. I didn’t know he was there and didn’t speak to him personally.”
“Were you and the late Lydia Ann Ferguson users?”
“The
late
Lydia Ann Ferguson?”
“Yes. She’s stopped. Were you users?”
“Yes.”
“Frequently?”
“No. A few times.”
“Did you admire her?”
“Yes.”
“Her brain, no doubt?”
“No. She was a silly ef. But I admired her.”
“Listen to this tape. ...”
Through the overhead loudspeaker came my own voice. Explaining to Lydia Ann Ferguson that I had been ordered to expedite a project that would cancel a dissident tribe of a friendly African nation. That tape should have been erased a long time ago. I tried not to reveal my shock.
“Is that your voice speaking, Flair?”
“Yes.”
“The project you are discussing with an object unauthorized to receive such information was, actually, a project you conceived and finalized some time previously. Is that correct?”
“Yes.”
“An ultrasecret project?”
“Top secret.”
“Very well, top secret. Why did you reveal it to this unauthorized object at that point in time? She had no security clearance.”
“In the first place, that conversation was couched in such general terms, she could not possibly make the connection with an actual project. In the second place—as I have stated several times before—my role was that of an undercover agent, with orders to infiltrate the conspiracy.”
“Whose orders?”
“Those of Angela Teresa Berri.”
“Berri is stopped.”
"I know that. But you’ll find in her confession a full explanation of the part I played. She praises what I did.”
“We are aware of that. But nowhere in that confession does she state that she ordered you to disclose classified material to an unauthorized object.”
“Ask Paul Bumford. He knew about it.”
‘We shall ask him. Now listen to this tape. ...”
Again it was my voice. This time explaining to Wiley, Hammond, the DeTilly brothers, et al., how I would manage to remove classified material from the compound at GPA-1.
I waited until the tape finished. Then exploded. . . .
“I’ve told you and told you,” I shouted angrily into the air. “I was serving as an undercover agent. It was the only way we could catch them in the act and provide enough evidence to convict.”
“In the Scilla matter, concerning the crimes of Angela Teresa Berri, you stated you did not take your suspicions to a higher authority because you didn’t know how far her conspiracy extended.”
“And because all I had were suspicions. No hard evidence.”
“But that doesn’t hold true for the Society of Obsoletes’ conspiracy, does it? You had more than suspicions in that case. You had hard evidence. A group of terrorists had attempted to suborn you. You had their conversation on tape. With your direct testimony, that would have been sufficient to convict. So why didn’t you take the whole matter to the Bureau of Public Security?”
“Angela Teresa Berri,” I said. “I did it the way she ordered me to do it.”
“Angela Teresa Berri is stopped,” he said hollowly, “and cannot testify to that. ”
“I know,” I groaned, “I know.”
What irked me, continually, was that what I had done was not all that awful. Illegal yes, but not awful. It had been done, was being done, and would be done by hundreds—thousands of objects in academe, multinational corporations, governments, and so forth. It had been, was being, and would be pillowed or glossed. The world would not falter for it. Good frequently resulted. Why was I being singled out for persecution and punishment? Where was the protection of my rank?