Fiction 1, Chapters 13 & 14

Chapter 13

"You can fool some of the people, all of the time."

Abraham Lincoln

"Listen to that man, boy. He knows what it takes to get ahead."

Anonymous

BISMARCK, ND:

I took the long way around to get back to Canada __back through the States, across to Butte, Montana, and then straight north.

The original camper was now stored in a rented barn on the outskirts of Bismarck, North Dakota, for the duration. Patrick Briody __that was my name for two days__ of Las Vegas, Nevada, was the proud leaseholder of a brand new lime-green Ranger II motorhome. It had taken me only an hour to find four gas stations who agreed that one dealer was the greediest, sneakiest bastard in town. Six months rental was paid in advance __three months rent and three months deposit__ totaling nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine dollars and ninety-nine cents, plus a thousand dollar tip under the table.

The dealer __Bubba was the name__ had originally wanted twelve thousand, but when I pointed out the advantages of cash, avarice had taken over. Any transaction of ten thousand or more is immediately reportable by Federal law. That's all right, I let him have the penny change, anyway. The Federal Reserve wrappers on the bills were a nice touch, I think.

The thousand dollars had been pulled out of the wrapped hundreds at random, so that he could submit them to the bank right away to make sure they were good bills. They weren't yet, but they would be.

Remember what I said about the "pigeon drop?"

When he finally got around to spending the other ten thousand, I thought he'd be all right if he scattered them around____ probably. I'd hate to take the chance myself, personally.

"How do I know the money's good?," he asked.

"Hey, Bubba! How do I know you own that Ranger motorhome?"

"I got the title."

I said, "O.K.! You show me the title, and then pull out a thousand bucks from my little nest egg there, at random. Mark the wrappers on the stacks that are light. Put it in the bank and check it out, then get the rig ready for the road. I'll be back in two days with the rest of the dough and we got a trade, right?"

Bubba was nobody's fool. "How do I know it's the same money, when you come back?"

I was nothing if not generous. "How about you keep it here in your safe for the two days. We'll both count the money and you give me a receipt for it. You tear up the receipt when I come back for the motorhome. O.K.?"

"O.K.." Bubba wasn't just anybody's fool; he was my fool.

"One hundred, two hundred...," I counted. "One thousand, right?"

"Let me see. One hundred, two hundred.... Right."

I asked for a receipt for the thousand separately, and also to see the title. When the title was in front of me, I started to make disgusting noises with my sinuses.

"You ought to get some kind of an operation for that honker." Thanks for the sympathy, Bubba.

I pulled out the old nasal spray and irrigated myself with it __while he fidgeted and squirmed__ then out came the sleazy, snotty handkerchief. By the time I had recovered, the ten fake hundreds in the sample were also recovered and the real ones substituted. A couple of good shots of the title were also in the Tessina.

We counted out the rest of the wrapped money in the case, and surprise! There was almost eighteen thousand there.

"That's all right, Bubba. I'll keep it with you in your safe, if you don't mind. I really don't like the looks of my motel all that much. Just mark it on the receipt for me and I'll pick it up day after tomorrow."

The case had a combination lock and I closed it, spinning the wheel. "Just to keep the help honest, my friend."

After he had locked the safe and I was walking out with the receipt, I told him about the safety mechanism in the case. "They say it won't damage anything outside the case, Bubba, but if I were you I'd be a mite careful about moving it around. You know?" It was the kind of statement that becomes true because it might as well be true as long as you cannot or dare not test it. Something like the paradox of Shrödinger's Cat in quantum physics.

Two days later I was pulling out of the lot in the Ranger, with a grinning Bubba spreading transplanted southern cheer all over the grim landscape. He was expecting Patrick Briody back in three months, to sign a year's lease on the same terms. I had the case back __with the almost eight thousand extra counterfeit, which I would burn as soon as possible__ along with Patrick Briody's identity.

"Next time, I'll bring a couple of showgirls, Bubba, and we can have some real fun."

Grinning even wider and bobbing his head like the little dog in the rear window, Bubba waved me out.

All of a sudden, I remembered another man of that name. A picture came to mind, of my father helpless with laughter as my mother described the haunting of that Bubba by Grandma's ghost. Over the telephone, no less.

I smiled back at this Bubba.

A visit to a junkyard along the way provided a new serial number strip, and a little work on the scanner and printer provided a new title for that number. An airbrush and some stencils converted the Ranger into a Winnebago war wagon for the Jehovah's Witnesses. Day-glo scriptures and all.

Who can tell one motorhome from another, half the time, anyway? Gerardo Laguna rides again!

I'd arranged for some boxes of pamphlets from Watchtower Publishing to be sent ahead to Billings on Laguna's account. It was there in Montana that I registered that vehicle in the name of that holy warrior. It really hurt having to pay the sales tax, but I'll more than make it up when it's resold someday __for real money, of course.

And it was fun again. I give a lot more away than I steal anyway. It almost makes up for all those years as a country man, a round peg trying to fit in a square hole.

Jack and Allison took the high road to Edmonton __the Yellowhead through Saskatoon__ while Uncle John and Mickey went round by way of the Trans-Canada through Regina and Calgary. It was Richard Quirk who couldn't afford to be isolated on those long straight roads __who was in more danger from the enemies of his enemies than his own. By now, the CIA had probably caught up with both border crossings through license plate photos, but I'd been using secondary roads to get to Bismarck where I'd virtually buried the last vehicle.

It was Gerardo who had brought his scandal-mongering crusade to Edmonton in a lime-green motorhome with fluorescent-pink verses from the Bible painted all over it. "REPENT" was also prominently featured in yellow. What a way to sneak into town. I loved it.

My own disguise was a baseball cap.

WINTERBURN, ALBERTA:

The four of them were helpless, liable at any moment to be savaged by the next Ninja field mouse that came down the pike.

"All right. All right. All RIGHT, Uncle John. That's enough. O.K.?"

But it wasn't enough. I'd known where they'd be staying as well as where I'd be staying __at the Glowing Embers RV park, just south of town. So I called them up, telling them that I was in town and to come over for breakfast. I just gave them the lot number. They knew enough to check for tails.

When I'd opened the door to invite them in, the slack-jawed idiots had doubled over at the sight. Uncle John was sitting on the ground, holding his stomach and whooping breathlessly. Mickey was actually lying down, helpless, and Jack and Allison were holding each other and grinning like idiots. That was only the second time I had seen any expression on the lovers' faces when they were together.

Completely disgusted, I got out of the motorhome to pull the other two off the ground. It was all right until I got behind Mickey, and my own eyes fell on that huge eyesore. Then there was no help for it but to join in. It was funny, no doubt about that.

"Why not plaid, while you were at it, nephew?"

We were all inside, holding a conference of war over a cup of coffee, when there was a sharp rap on the door. Jack herded Allison back toward the bedroom, picked up the shotgun leaning by the doorpost and looked at me.

I nodded at Jack, signing that the gun was fully loaded, with the safety on, and then opened the door outward.

There were two well-dressed young men outside __carrying clipboards, Bibles and Watchtower magazines__ so I invited them in for a little cocoa. They could tell I was a backslider from the coffee smell, but they came aboard anyway and stayed for twenty or thirty minutes.

You would have thought that there would have been a lot of Bible-thumping going on, wouldn't you? Well, we mostly talked about what had happened to the Blue Jays and the Expos in the pennant races __just as if we weren't a motley collection of religious fanatics, gypsy grifters and a recovering psychopath.

Actually, they were nice guys. The next time Jehovah's Witnesses come to my door, I think I'll invite them in just to see the shock on their faces when somebody treats them like human beings. I've always wanted to explain ancient Irish religious beliefs to a captive audience anyway. I gave them some of my pamphlets.

Down to business.

Uncle John was to rent a limousine and a chauffeur's cap to go with it. He could buy three suits on me, black, blue and gray, to go with them. The Anglo-Irish aristocrat was coming out to play. John McGovern was going to hate this part of it.

I should make a very long story very short, and explain that I had gotten the Northern Irish passport a few years ago, from a Traveller cousin in Ireland __using the name of another cousin, deceased. You never know when you'll have an identity crisis. The visa for Canada had been totally faked. What I lack in natural talent for forgery is more that made up by access to underground computer bulletin boards that can provide a silk-purse pedigree for any oinker in the land. But they cost __they really cost.

Jack and Mickey would look up Bruno Tedeschi __posing as brothers of their dead cousins__ and get his story. I gave them both Newfoundland driver's licenses and some credit cards that wouldn't work, for ID, along with some guidelines for the questions to ask.

The McGovern boys would do all right; they didn't need much of a background. But I was hoping to use my cover to penetrate the upper echelons of a secret conspiracy to destroy a nation.

A Northern Irish identity was my original choice for an international alter-ego because of the confusion and violence in the area. So many years of conflict there would cover a lot of gaps and provide a lot of motivation for any story that had to be made up to meet my needs.

If the Ukrainians had been the dominant force in the affair, Alan Carter might have been a Roman Catholic __but since they looked more like pawns to me so far, Carter would be an Orangeman, a good Presbyterian. Perhaps a man seeking a safe haven for his people, in the face of an eventually lost cause. Another "orphan."

But why would the Institute pay any attention to me, as Carter? There was no real background to that name, no depth to the cover.

Why? Because Alan Carter would know people, and places and other secrets of theirs. And he was so potent a player that he couldn't be traced. He would dare them to try to pierce the secret of his real identity. They would have to let him in. They just wouldn't have to let him out, if he made any mistakes.

It doesn't sound as threatening when I think of Alan Carter as "He" instead of "Me."

"And what if I don't take to kindly to being your driver and man-servant, Mr. High-and-Mighty Quirk," Uncle John protested.

"Then you'll just have to learn your place, Basset."

"Basset!" he screamed. "You goddam bastard. I'll get you for this, nephew; I will."

"Don't forget to shine my shoes each night, Uncle," I insisted. "That's very important if you'd like to make a good impression on a new Master, you know."

"You'll be lucky if I don't give you an impression in your skull, Richard Quirk."

First, John had to get the limo and then I'd book us into the best hotel in town. The best suite for me, naturally, and something adequate for my man's man, like a closet.

"Uncle? I never thought to ask. Have you ever tried going to sleep without actually lying down? We'd save a lot of glonth that way."

The visit from the Witnesses reminded me that it was Sunday, so I took a walk down to the camp-ground store to get a newspaper, while I reviewed my options. The Sunday comics are an addiction of mine.

It would probably take a week to sniff around the edges. Meanwhile, Jack, Mickey and Allison could hold down the fort in the camper. I'd be back and forth to use the computers.

Not being able to rely on Mac had forced me to use my own brain, and brawn unfortunately. Chopping and prying open one of the local pay phones was necessary to research the connections, but I had come up with an infra-red signaling unit that would hook me up to the lines. Not fancy like Mac's; it needed two holes drilled through the backboard into the telephone casing, and would only work well at night. It wasn't as fast either, but the jury rig would just have to do.

Most of the parts had been picked up from a Radio Shack in Bismarck while I was waiting on Bubba, along with some CB transceivers, a portable scanner and a broad-band instrument for measuring radio-frequency field intensity. The latter sounds bigger than it is; it's a hand-held unit called an RF signal-strength meter. Ham radio operators and technicians use them.

I took a look through the paper as an excuse, ashamed to be observed heading directly for the funnies.

"Hey, listen to this:

DATELINE: OTTAWA. The Prime Minister announced today that Canada will host a series of international conferences to prepare for an expected change of climate due to the Greenhouse Effect. Groundwork for a treaty to be known as the Aurora Compact will be laid at that time.

The meetings will be held in seven Canadian Cities from October 3rd through the 17th, or in some cases, October 24th. Each city will accommodate a different group: Heads of State in Ottawa, Legislative leaders in Montreal, Corporations in Toronto, Physical Scientists in Vancouver, Life Sciences in Calgary, Civil Servants in Halifax, and the Military in Montreal.

The initial conclave, to be held in Ottawa,

The Government stressed that the conferences are being held to more responsibly formulate solutions for problems that could arise "not for many years, perhaps a century from now," and should serve to improve the level of public confidence in both the economies of Canada and the U.S.A.. Each of those countries will be underwriting half of the cost of the event."

"People," I announced, "it doesn't take any great genius to figure out that there might be a connection between this Aurora Compact business and all those guns sitting in Central Manitoba. Two unlikely events, coming along at the same time like this, is a little stretchy. Even if they hadn't planned on this to begin with, it's a perfect opportunity for them."

John McGovern looked doubtful. "You're not serious, nephew, are you?"

"I'm not figuring that they'd put the snatch on a bunch of world leaders. No, Uncle! Or put a hit on the military conference __that would be suicide for them. But this is going to stretch any counter-intelligence and counter-insurgency capabilities up here to the max. And that business of holding the Military conferences in Montreal __the Prime Minister might as well wave a Union Jack in front of a French bull. They're going to see it as an attempt at intimidation, no matter what the intent."

Jack asked, "So what will the Institute do, do you think?"

"I don't know," I confessed, "but it would have to be something extremely embarrassing to the Canadian Confederation. Something that would destroy its credibility, any confidence internally or externally that the Confederation could maintain order. It wouldn't be the result of food shortages or general lack of prosperity, like the old Soviet Union. It would have to be something violent __but limited__ given the time frame Dupont was talking about. And it must be something that would convince the Indians, the French, other Canadians, and the outside world that there was no hope of reconciliation between them."

"How long have you been thinking this way, Richard?" John McGovern wanted to know.

"Frankly, Uncle, about two minutes. But it makes sense. An armed uprising could fracture the Confederation, sure. But, if the country is already split, those weapons make a lot more sense. Then they could be used to arm the nucleus of what would appear to be a self-defense force, but still be completely under the control of the Institute, of course."

"But where would they strike?" he asked, "There are meetings in almost every major city in the country __except the very one that we're in. And how will this tell us who killed my nephews?"

"What's 'chimney-kicking,' Uncle John?"

"That's where you walk up to a front door with a brick in your hand and tell the owner it fell from his chimney."

"Then what do you do?" I asked.

"If the owner is too old or too fat to climb, you get your ladder off the truck. Then you clamber up to the roof and start kicking his chimney __until some corner bricks fall out and slide off the roof. Or you use a screwdriver, maybe. Then you charge whatever the market will bear __collect in advance__ and put them back in with a little silicone sealer."

"Well," I told him, "we're going to kick some chimneys until the right brick pops out. We'll know it when we see it."

I hoped.

The CBC news from northern Manitoba and north-western Ontario was uniformly miserable.

A sixteen year old girl had been raped and mutilated by a "gang of black men," suspected to be residents of Thunder Bay, Ontario.

There was a furor brewing in Moosonee, Ontario, over new allegations concerning physical and sexual abuse of Indian schoolchildren by un-named white teachers. A school boycott resulted, and several male and female teachers had been assaulted and beaten by unknown assailants.

Back in Winnipeg, the Catholic Bishops of central Canada were pressured to expand on their public apologies of previous years for the abusive and culturally genocidal treatment of First Canadian children since before the turn of the century.

Chapter 14

"Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's;

and unto God the things that are God's."

New Testament, King James Bible

EDMONTON, ALBERTA:

The Sunday paper had also listed another conference; this one to take place the following Friday. It was sponsored by the New World Institute and the general public was invited. One of the featured guest speakers would be Monsignor Bruno Tedeschi, of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, and his subject would be Improving Emergency Response in Eco-disasters.

It turned out that particular order consists mostly of lay people, and their prime function is to act like a Catholic Red Cross to provide non-sectarian emergency relief after earthquakes, eruptions, hurricanes, and the lot. They have been known as The Knights Hospitalers for about nine hundred years.

Through the ages they were also called the Knights of Rhodes and the Knights of Malta. If memory served, the Hospitalers were historically a militant order as well, serving as shock troops for Christianity on land and sea. -God's Holy Marines. Well, well-

Monday, we laid the groundwork. Uncle John arranged for the limousine __along with a separate Chevy sedan from a different agency for our regular use__ and I made reservations for a suite at the Fantasyland Hotel, a first-class hotel built into one end of the largest shopping mall in the world.

The credit cards we used were just as fraudulent as Mickey's and Jack's, but their magnetic stripes worked. The accounts are valid and the bills get paid promptly. It's just that the identities are false.

There wasn't much that could be done about the limo, but we "borrowed" some new license plates for the sedan just as a precaution.

To do it the Quirk way takes a little effort; stealing the plates of car number one, parked anywhere, and then switching them for the plates on your car. Your plates go in your trunk. Then park next to the long-term lot at a large airport and wait for car number two to pull in. Wait a little bit __switch plates again__ and you've got yourself a pretty clean set __good for at least a week.

Do it twice, while you're at it. It doesn't take much time; just be sure to have some penetrating oil handy, along with a small adjustable wrench and a rechargeable power screwdriver. Use push-on, Tinnerman-type nuts as replacements on the other vehicles, and nylon fasteners on your own. Got that?

On Tuesday, Jack made several calls to St. Basil's from various pay phones, trying to set up an appointment with Tedeschi. It took three tries over a two hour period __from three different locations__ before we got a rise out of anybody. I had coached Jack on the pitch to use, and he also had a suction-cup pick-up on the telephone handset to tape the conversation for me. It was about two in the afternoon.

We had picked out the pay phone sites very carefully, and we would not stay connected for more than two minutes unless he reached the good Monsignor in person.

We were able to communicate with CB radios, and there was a broad-band scanner in the Chevy we were using, which Mickey was driving. Uncle John was in one of the pick-ups with another CB, and both of our vehicles were situated to keep an eye on the area around Jack, who was on foot.

Not to worry about radio privacy. We were using Travellers' Cant, of course.

On the first call to the Seminary at Mundare, Jack simply asked, "Can I speak to Monsignor Tedeschi?"

The response: "Sorry, we'll have to take a message."

Ours: "Ask him to call this number in the next half-hour."

There was no call-back, and there was no overt interest in the caller apparently.

On the second call from a different phone, Jack received the same response and made the same request, except that he added, "Tell him it's about the Geoghans." That was the last name that our cousins had been using in Manitoba. Again, there was no call-back and there was still no attention being paid to us.

On the third call, Jack said, "Tell the Monsignor that it's important. It's about the two boys with him in Manitoba, who were killed."

The operator promised that the Monsignor would get the message.

"What do you think, nephew?" That was Uncle John, over the CB. Translated from the Cant, of course.

"I think if there's no call-back after that," I told him, "then he's not there now, period."

We both had Jack and his phone booth under study from different vantage points, waiting to see if we struck any sparks of interest. The third time was the charm. There was still no call-back, but within twenty minutes a suspiciously studious car was making lazy circles around the area.

Uncle John spotted it first; there was nothing on the scanner. He warned Jack and me with three touches of the talk button on his transceiver. The three sudden silences in the static told Jack to skip to a prearranged pick-up point where Uncle John would pick him up.

They would wait for me at the next of the pay phone sites that we'd picked out specifically for observation and get-away advantages.

Mickey had to stay pretty close to that other car to follow it in an semi-unfamiliar city. Edmonton had been a stop-over for me a few times before actually, but it was far from being my hometown and my young cousin had never been there before. Luckily for me, the driver ahead had very little experience at this kind of thing __less than we did, it seemed.

He stopped at a diner, but Mickey and I went on past without slowing and turned right at the next corner. A diner at three-thirty in the afternoon didn't make too much sense. So we intended to circle the block a few times and double-check for any tails behind.

But we didn't. There were screeches on the scanner that were just the right duration to be voice communications, not data bursts. Somebody in the area had a Digital Encryption System, probably NSA, working on their communications equipment.

It was time to take off like a bat out of Hell. The screeches followed us.

-Oh my God, the kid's losing the rear end already. Watch out for the goddamn pedestrians. Oh Jesus, I don't want to look-

It was a pretty sure thing, who had set me up. The CIA. They weren't really prepared to follow anybody in a strange city either, expecting me to enter the diner. There must have been a loose tail on the car we had been following. He, she or it had tagged us without much difficulty, knowing where the first car was headed for anyway.

-Shit! Where did that truck come from? We're dead meat! I think we lost something hitting the curb-

The second transmitter __and hopefully the only other one__ had most likely been staking out the diner, waiting for the parade to arrive.

-I promise! I really do. Just keep me alive. Take the kid if you have to, but not me, not yet-

That working hypothesis was no help to me at the moment. But three assumptions seemed reasonable: that the Company didn't maintain a permanent cadre in Edmonton, that they were totally undercover, and they couldn't call the local cops into play.

-What the Hell am I praying for? I'm a God-damned agnostic. Who am I kidding and who's the patron saint of agnostics, anyway. The way Mickey's going, I'm going to meet the holy bastard any second-

They'd need to pick me up someplace quiet and out of sight. And the odds were, that the other two drivers were on worse terms with the city geography than I was.

There was a large high-security, underground garage not too far away, I recalled. -You tend to notice useful things in any way of life, but especially in mine. Even in a panic- We headed for it. By the time the Chevy got there, there was still about a one block lead on two cars burning rubber behind me.

Mickey made a sharp left up the ramp and into the entrance, slammed on the brakes and grabbed a ticket from the machine. After we had passed completely over the one-way tire prongs, I had him hit the brake while I tumbled out the passenger's door.

-I've never been so glad to get out of a car in my life-

The adjustable wrench was already in my hand, and I jumped out of the car and back to the entrance in a flash. It took two seconds to wedge the wrench under the counter-balanced prongs; then it was back in the car, while we waited.

Losing them wouldn't have been much of a problem, but that's not what I needed. They had to be disabled and stranded for awhile.

The first vehicle stopped at the entrance without turning, not quite sure where I had pulled in. I wagged my tail at them __by having Mickey pump the brake lights__ and then we took off.

Roar! It sounded like the start-up at Le Mans.

The first, then the second car were rushing in, headed for the jammed prongs. Too bad we really couldn't hang around long enough to see all of the fun and listen to their tires pop.

The collector at the exit end of the underground labyrinth was not overjoyed with our ticket at first glance; not for an accumulated parking debt of one minute, less a five minute grace period. He figured we were taking a short-cut.

I passed a twenty dollar bill to Mickey for him. "Keep the change, friend."

"Thank you, sir. Have a nice day."

"Too late for that, but thanks anyway."

I turned to Mickey.

"Nice work at the wheel, kid," I told him. "A little demented, but nice."

"What does demented mean, Uncle Richard." Sarcasm was disguised as innocence; he'd enjoyed scaring me witless.

"It means you done good, Mickey."

It felt lonely, but more comfortable, retracing the getaway route without a tail. I asked Mickey to hold it down so I could think a little.

-And maybe fish my Adam's Apple back up where it belonged-

Sure enough, what I wanted to see most was still parked outside the diner.

The front entrance was a bit too public for what I had in mind, so I kept one eye out from a distance while Mickey shifted to the other set of stolen plates. Our car was about a block away from the diner, parked in a convenience store lot. Nobody there paid any attention to what he was doing with the plates, naturally.

I took the wheel, pulled out of the lot and made a right, then the next left. Spotting an alleyway with a dumpster, I backed in all the way. There was no trace of any scrambled or coded signals on the scanner.

My entrance through the kitchen didn't seem to bother anyone, and I headed out a side door that opened onto the rest room corridor. The target could be seen through the glass panel on the outer door. The pay phone next to the men's room served for a call to the next telephone number on the list, taking Jack and his father off duty for the day.

Finally, I left the corridor and silently walked up behind my quarry who was seated at the counter. We were both out of sight of the front door and windows.

The pepper spray was well positioned in my left hand, while my right hand prodded his back with the end of my fountain pen. Only for a split second, though; he might have taken up Kung-fu since the last time we had met.

The man at the counter froze in place, his hands occupied with a newspaper. There was an empty dinner plate and a half-full coffee cup on the counter in front of the paper.

I tried to make my voice as elegant and smooth as possible.

"Could you pass the Pepto-Bismol, Morty?"

Before we left by the back door, I patted him down for recorders and scanned his body with the RF meter for electronic beacons. He wasn't armed, and I hadn't expected him to be. It's not that Morty isn't trustworthy, but you don't take chances with a Judas goat.

We took off in my car. Morty wasn't able to make out the plate number in the dark alley, so I wasn't compromising his federal integrity. There was no scanner activity, except for the occasional distant half-heard squawk of a cop car or trucker.

Precautions had to be taken, anyway. There's no law that says your opponents have to stay ignorant; just the opposite, really. I dropped Mickey off at the Mall to catch a movie.

Both of us were pretty silent while I drove north on Route 2, toward Slave Lake. The lake is named after the Indian tribe, which is pronounced "Slay vie," but the lake is pronounced the normal way. Morty found that less than fascinating. He was still a little wound up and mad at me. "You're costing me my job and my pension, pal, and maybe ten years in Leavenworth."

Oblivious to any constructive criticism, much less un-focussed complaints, I prodded him. "That's obvious, Morty, judging from your buddies' strong inclination to kidnap me. What I don't know is why or how. All I know is that some of my family have been killed, a thousand miles from here."

-Morty didn't connect that with anything. Hell, they couldn't know anything about the guns or the Farm. Or else, they would have been all over us back there, anyway-

"The trail leads to Edmonton," I told him, "and the CIA is jumping all over me. You know I'm not in your business and I never have been. This is strictly personal."

Morty got agitated; agitated for him, that is. "Maybe for you, Dick. But it isn't personal for us. There's something big going down, and you're in a position to mess up our response."

"Bullshit! I made a couple of inquiries in civvy data banks. One on some Ukrainian farmers, one on an international think tank and another on a holy hit man, whose line you've illegally tapped."

-If Tedeschi had been working with them, he'd have been on the phone, stringing Jack along while they tried to collect us. They must think I know his voice, or there would have been a decoy-

We shifted west, from route 2 to route 44, northbound.

"The Ukrainians and that other priest I asked you about weren't even on the Watch List until after my data probes," I informed him. "Your boys didn't know anything about them until then."

He got defensive. "So? What's it to you?"

"This, Morty: Your people are sniffing around from the other end. Maybe it's Switzerland; maybe South Africa. Or it could be Rome, the good Monsignor." I was gauging his reactions with my peripheral vision and centralized sniffer.

-I could tell now; it was Rome-

"You've got a whiff of the strategic side here in Edmonton, but not even a clue as to how: the tactical end of things. Your boss probably doesn't even know their goal __the end, much less the means."

-Morty was getting more and more tense. If his boss did know anything more, he hadn't shared it-

It was time for a little friendly mind-bending.

"Why do you think they sent you here?" I asked him. "The last I heard you were expecting South America."

"Costa Rica, actually. I'm supposed to be reporting back independently to Bracken, the DC Western, on our progress here."

"You really believe that?"

"I did until this afternoon," he said, "when I was sent out on a wild-goose chase, and waited an hour for a contact that never showed up."

"Then you've probably figured it out. I was supposed to be the contact, although neither one of us knew about it. You're nothing but bait to them now, Morty. And that's not my fault, or your fault __that's just the way it is with them. We're both expendable."

It wasn't possible to tell whether he was mad enough to help me overtly, or even covertly __and it wasn't my intention to push him too hard anyway.

"What do you think I should I do?" he asked me. "I've got an urge to go back to D.C. and spit in Bracken's eye."

"Remember your alimony payments, my friend. Don't blow your top. There could be a way you can do your job and get to rub Bracken's nose in his own bullshit at the same time. Interested?"

Morty was. I'd have to think of something clever, and soon.

For openers, Morty was given a message for Bracken.

Leave us alone!

We would try to stay out of the CIA's way, and any information of interest to them that we turned up would be shared. If they behaved themselves for a reasonable period, we would give them what we already had on the tactical plans and capabilities of the Institute. All of the same information would be given to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the source attributed to the CIA. That would keep them honest, and still give them bragging rights.

This was a non-negotiable ultimatum.

Any problems; then all cooperation __and the credit__ went to the Treasury's Secret Service. The secret CIA files on BCCI, the terrorist and drug bankers, would be exposed as well.

"You actually read them?" It boggled his mind.

"No, not really. It's bigger than an encyclopedia; who's got the time? But I can dump copies right into the news networks, among others. If I don't periodically update a couple of data buckets here and there, they go to press automatically. Tell him that." Bracken would be exposed to the Administration as the man who had let it happen. The same way.

Morty pursed his lips to whistle, but nothing came out.

"He might have me killed when I tell him this, Dick."

"Could be," I admitted. "That's an honorable tradition of long standing in 'The Great Game,' my friend. But if you don't warn him, and he forces the issue as a consequence, you can be sure that he'll bury you with the rest of the evidence."

"Jesus." He slouched down in the car seat, unconsciously making himself a smaller target.

"You must mean Yeshwah Bar Yussif, your fellow Jew."

"I don't know what I mean. I didn't plan to dig my own grave when I came out here, Dick?" He was trembling slightly.

I said, as gently and sincerely as I could, "You didn't plan at all, Morty, when you came out here. Bracken did all the scheming for both of you. If I were you, I'd rest easy though, he'll assume that you're protected by the ultimatum, too. And you are."

"You're assuming in turn that he just won't wipe you out, and to hell with threats." Bracken's status still had him intimidated, apparently.

I laughed. "Ask him to look over my file again, and remind him that I take things personally."

"You'd actually set all that up." He gave me a dubious look.

"I already have, Morty. There's been plenty of time."

Morty believed it; whether Bracken would, only time would tell. One thing was sure; he might not kill me in the face of my threats, but he wouldn't stop trying to catch me. Not until he got burned for trying it.

Morty answered a few questions for me about where he was quartered and his daily routine. Then we set up a message drop, along with a book code for any detailed information that had to be passed, and a protocol for arranging meetings. The time would be two hours before the stated time, and the place would be six city blocks __or half a kilometer__ east of the stated place.

Needless to say, there would be other precautions besides the ones we set up together. I trusted Morty so far, but it would be foolish to trust him too far. Mama didn't raise no fools.

There was more bad news that night from central Canada; three more reports of rape and sodomy against Indian and Metis' women and, in one case, a child. The suspects sought in each case were white.

Several burning crosses had been left on the property of tribal leaders, while the perpetrators had fired shots into the owners' homes. None of those had been identified, much less apprehended.

A Baptist church had been torched, apparently in some sort of retribution.

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You are at Fiction 1, Chapters 13 & 14