PROLOGUE

WESTMOREHAM INSTITUTE FOR TREATMENT OF THE CRIMINALLY INSANE
WASHINGTON STATE, SOUTHEAST REGION, USA
SEPTEMBER 8

Perkins, the night-watchman, strolled into his narrow booth. He had been walking his first round through the worn, whitewashed corridors of the institution.

"One o'clock and all's well," he mumbled almost inaudibly -- and immediately shook his head, as if reproaching himself for saying so.

The night-watchman eased his fat, uniformed body into a swivel-chair made of pale wood. He switched on a tiny color TV set on the desk before him; one that had earlier been used for the surveillance cameras, before the institution replaced them with infra-red sensors. Perkins's favorite show came on, and the comedian on the screen was going through his end monologue:

"...and my Prozacs wouldn't understand me, and my girlfriend failed to comfort me -- or was it the other way around?"

(Laughter from the audience)

"And it was then, when my lawyer said: 'Eddie, your overdraft facility is sending me telepathic messages', and I asked him 'What's the shit, man?', and he said: 'Eddie, get your life in order; you should seek out some wise man and find the meaning of your life', it was then I flew to see this guru in Nepal, who lived in a little hut by the foot of the Himalayas.

"I entered, said hello, and asked him -- no, begged him: 'Talk to me, Master! My life has lost its meaning. And the world seems to be falling apart around me; why does nothing make sense anymore?!'

"And the guru stroked his long, stripy beard -- he looked like a hundred years, could easily have been that guy in 'The Golden Child' -- and answered: 'At the top of this mountain lies a cave. In that cave lives a holy man, who has beheld the secret of Creation. The last time I heard from him was fifty years ago. If you hurry, you might get to meet him before he leaves this world.'

"So I hired a couple of Sherpas who took me all the way up that high, snowy mountain. The wind blew like hell all the way. But after walking for two days across slippery, icy paths, we reached the holy man's cave. It was all covered with snow; we had to dig out the opening; and I staggered inside, dead beat.

"In there was a tiny little furnished rock shelter, lit by candles, and almost all of them had burned out. Man, it was freezing in there. And at the very end of the shelter there was an extremely old, bald man, lying in a small bed, shivering with cold.

"I covered the holy man with my jacket, and an interpreter translated my question to him: 'What is the secret of Creation?' The ancient, toothless man whispered something in the ear of the interpreter -- and then he died.

"I shouted: 'What'd he say?! What'd he say?!', shaking the interpreter's shoulders.

And the interpreter looked gravely at me for a looong moment... and he said: 'Beats me, I don't understand French at all.'"

The roars of laughter from the TV set mixed with the night-watchman's chuckles. An imaginary listener who wouldn't have known Perkins, might have believed he was sobbing. From the corridors of the institution came no sounds, except the occasional ticking of the strip-lights, and a faint whisper of wind from the old ventilators. The patients in their cells slept: the deep, dreamless sleep brought only by large drug doses.

1

WESTMOREHAM COUNTY
WASHINGTON STATE, SOUTHEAST REGION
SEPTEMBER 8

Dr. Abram Lemercier leaned forward over the steering-wheel, squinting. His thick glasses did not improve his view much in the compact haze that wrapped over the billowing fields ahead of him. He glanced at the satellite-linked roadmap on the tiny dashboard screen; a blinking cursor, representing the car, assured him of an absolute position in the world.

Lemercier, a man of fifty-three years with a worried face and beginning baldness, stroked his pointed, droopy white moustaches with his left hand and looked up at the rear-view mirror. His hand habitually drew across the short, graying beard and adjusted the bow tie of his brown tweed costume. That didn't make him look less tired -- his shoulder-long white back-hair suggested a considerably wilder life, which this middle-aged man in a rented car had left behind him long ago.

Abram sighed lightly and switched on the radio. "Urban" country music -- he switched to another station. Classic Seattle grunge rock -- he switched again. At the third switching came some obscure local station.

"...out for the fog, okay? You're listening to WRBC, reaching five thousand listeners twenty-four hours a day! The joke of the week:

"Where can you find the dumbest people in Westmoreham? In City Hall. And where can you find the smartest ones? When they found out who sat in City Hall, they ended up in the Institute!"

(Canned laughter)

"For our dear nutcases we will now play 'They're Coming To Take Me Away, Ha-Ha!'"

A monotonous, bizarre tune followed; the refrain was sung by a hysteric falsetto backed up by a stomping, tambourine-clapping beat, and a siren wailed in the background:

"They're coming to take me away, ha-ha
They're coming to take me away, ho-ho, hi-hi, ha-ha..."

In the middle of the song, Lemercier's cell-phone started to beep inside his jacket; he switched off the radio. He pulled out the handset-shaped box and held it to his right ear, pressing the receiving button.

"Hello?"

A soft female computer-voice answered: "Incoming call from Langley. Use de-scrambling program number four."

Abram got a tauter, more alert expression around his mouth and eyes. With his eyes still on the road ahead, he pressed a button on the phone with his right hand middle finger.

A nasal, but deep Southern drawl came from the receiver: "Eh-bram? It's Wilson! How's the weather up there?"

Abram smiled briefly and relaxed a little.

"Hi, Ned! Unfortunately it's too foggy for me to see what kinda weather it is outside. Will you request a report?"

"Ha ha... nah, that can wait until you've reached Westmoreham. Y'know, it's the new policy of the Company to create a spirit of mutual understanding and easy communication between chiefs and employees, by scheduling time for more informal exchange... like, letting off steam."

The words sounded rehearsed, or ironically read from a script. Ned's tone went to the painstakingly casual.

"So, how is it, Abram? Is everything okay?"

Abram's face went taut again, and his brow wrinkled up to his scalp.

"I'm fine," he said mutely. "Last health check was in August, and the doctors found no problems."

"Ehxcellent, ehxcellent. No outbreaks of middle-age crah-sis, ah hope?"

His tone was joking, disarming. Abram replied in the same tone, obviously used to chatting with Ned Wilson.

"I'm an educated psychologist, Ned. I've been into self-analysis since I had my first pimples, so don't worry. How about you, Ned? Do you still hit your wife in the face very often?" Ned's voice choked a laughter -.

"But seriously, Abram, I'm sure you feel fine, and I'm sure that if there'd be anything, you wouldn't think twihce about telling me. See ya!"

"Yeah. Bye."

Abram put the phone back into his inside pocket, still looking straight ahead of him. He was now driving into the outskirts of the southern edge of the small town, a broad street lined with low buildings and a few people on the sidewalks. The mist had cleared somewhat -- or he had left it behind -- and the sharp blue sky was starting to appear above.

He saw the sign saying WESTMOREHAM INSTITUTE 1.5 MILES and made a right turn. He took off from the short, uninteresting main street and drove into the soft, undulating farm landscape which abruptly succeeded the low, flat houses. Tractors were plowing up the earth on both sides of the road; a few farmhouses lay half-hidden between the dune-like hills. The mist was now reduced to steaming pools in the shadows between the dunes, and far ahead Abram was able to see the distant blue mountains rise above the landscape.

From a distance, the Westmoreham Institute stood out from the horizon, sharply outlined against the clear, late morning sky: a dark-brown brick building with whitewashed cornerstones, a pointed tile roof, and chimneys like steeplechases. The rounded chapel and the arched front portal with the fan-shaped steps increased its vague church-like appearance. But in contrast, metal bars blocked each of the two-story building's tall windows - and a high barbed-wire fence surrounded spacious lawn of the estate.

Abram made a left turn into the parking-lot before the fence, and slid in next to the sentry-booth at the steel-bar gates. A security guard's head popped out through the glass booth, condensed air steaming from his mouth. He was heavily muffled up, with earmuffs outside his uniform cap.

"Good morning, sir," he called out with a clenched smile. "Do you have an appointment?"

Abram lowered the power-window and squinted at the raw, cold air. Keeping his head inside the car, he handed over a bundle of papers. A sudden gust almost tore them from his grip, but the guard quickly snatched them with his hand. Abram gave the guard a sheepish smile. He grinned back.

"Not the first time that happens, sir. If we'd had any trees or flags around here, people would be prepared for those squalls."

He pulled his hand into the booth and studied the papers.

"I'm Abram Lemercier, psychologist from Virginia," Abram said a little awkwardly. "Here to study a patient."

The guard looked up from the clearance papers and examined Abram's face with measured eyes, compared it with something on his table, and talked into the intercom next to him -- still with his eyes on Abram.

Then he said, in a more formal tone: "Dr. Oregon is awaiting you, sir. You may walk in now."

Abram frowned in mild amazement. Walk? The guard shrugged.

"Those are the rules, sir. All vehicles, including bicycles, must be left outside the fence. If you have a lot of baggage, I could ask a warden to help you carry..."

"No, that won't be necessary," Abram said quickly. "Thank you."

He backed the car into an empty VISITOR space, put on his coat and hat, grabbed his briefcase and stepped out, locking the car. Holding his hat with one hand on his head, Abram walked toward the gates. The guard gave the go-ahead and the gates rolled apart with a whirring sound.

Abram hesitated for a moment, turned in the wind and called out at the guard: "Tell me, why haven't you got a flag here?"

The guard shouted back: "We had to take it away, because the sight of it made our patients restless!"

Abram stared in disbelief at the guard for a second, then spun around and walked briskly through the gates. They immediately clanged shut behind him.

2

When Lemercier was about ten meters from the entrance, it opened: a steel door, fitted into the portal.

A short black woman in a doctor's white coat, dark blue trousers, and soft shoes stepped outside. The door shut heavily behind her. At once she saw Abram and paced down the steps toward him. They met at the foot of the steps. He stretched out his hand, and the woman shook it formally. Lemercier, who was of medium height, would have stood one head higher than her, unless she had been standing on the first step. She had a small, round face, and her hair was drawn back into a neck bun. Her age appeared to be about thirty-five.

"Dr. Lemercier?" The woman gave him a cool smile. "I'm Dr. Joyce Oregon, medical superintendent and director of the Westmoreham Institute. Did you enjoy your travel?"

Lemercier smiled, clasping her hand an instant longer than usual, then released it. "Just fine, thank you. Are these sudden fogs common around here?"

Joyce looked briefly confused, then brightened up and gave out a laugh.

"Oh, that!" she said. "No, they don't come very often. It's the proximity to the Rockies that's causing them, I've been told. Come in, and I'll see that you get a pass-card."

They walked up the steps to the steel door. Dr. Oregon stuck a plastic card into a slot next to the door, and several bolts clicked as it opened. They came into a clearly lit hall, with yet another steel door a few feet away. Oregon looked up at what appeared to be a tiny surveillance camera, and spoke toward its microphone tube.

"It's all clear, Mark... check with the entrance guard for confirmation."

The inner steel door clicked open, and Abram and Joyce continued into the main building.

"This guard, Mark," Abram said searchingly, "is he a suspicious fellow?"

Joyce answered calmly, without turning his way: "No, I urged him to make a security check."

Joyce briskly marched on, Abram following with a tinge of worry in his eyes. They entered a wide, tall old whitewashed corridor, and arrived at a small glass booth at one side of the corridor's end. Joyce made a slight wave of her hand at the guard, who was sitting in there studying a number of flat-screen monitors hanging on the wall. The guard caught her eyes, spun around on his old swivel-chair of pale wood, and pushed open a window.

"Mark," Joyce said, "this is Dr. Abram Lemercier, a psychologist come from Virginia to carry out a special study of Parry."

The guard nodded and smiled briefly at Abram. Joyce looked at Abram with a serious face.

"Dr. Lemercier, this is Mark Fosse, he's working the day shift at the doors all week, in normal cases. Should you happen to see someone else in his place at daytime... well, I'll bring you a copy of the guard list. Mark, would you please format a pass-card for the doctor."

"Sure, Joyce. Could you please put your thumbprint on this scanner, Doc?"

While talking, the guard had taken out a small flat box from a cabinet and pressed some buttons, like a man using a pocket calculator. A little white rectangle started to flash at one end of the box; in a LED display Abram could see the text "ACCESS CODE CONFIRMED---PLACE PRINT ON SENSOR SURFACE" scroll past. He pressed his thumb on the box held forth by the guard, and the gadget gave a beep.

"Thank you, that'll do," the guard said.

A larger box inside the cabinet, wired to the small scanner box, whizzed and clicked, then spat out a new pass-card. The guard pulled out the card and handed it to Abram -- it was still warm.

Joyce explained: "Since a year now, everyone going in and out of the main building -- except the patients, of course -- has one of these 'smart cards'. When you stick it into a scanner slot, the card gets electric power to 'read' the user's thumbprint and compare it to the print in its memory chip. That means this card" -- she pointed at the card in his hand -- "only gives access when you use it... so take care of it, and don't lose your thumb."

"The cameras at the entrance and the doors..." Abram began to ask.

"Those are infrareds," Mark fell in. "It turned out to be safer to identify people by reading their thermal 'body-prints', after Parry had stolen a... er, Dr. Oregon could explain it to you, sir."

Mark suddenly looked at Joyce with half-concealed embarrassment. Joyce Oregon gave them both a secretive smile, but briefly.

"It's okay, Mark. Let's go up to my office, Dr. --"

"Just call me Abram, by all means. If I may call you by your first name..?"

Abram looked innocently into Joyce's black eyes, and she raised an ironic eyebrow. A hint of a smile escaped her lips, before she calmly turned around and walked toward a narrow staircase opposite the booth. Abram cast a questioning glance at the guard -- but he was already busy locking up the scanner equipment.

Dr. Abram Lemercier, fifty-three, paced up the stairs after the short, brown-skinned woman, briefly displaying a breathless, boyish lack of dignity.

3

"I know how weird this place feels the first time, Abram."

Joyce was still wearing her doctor's coat, reclining in a chair behind her overloaded desk. Abram sat facing her in a sunbleached, stuffed armchair, stiffly holding his briefcase in his lap. The sun, now just past noon, was shining through the windows behind Joyce's back, creating drapes of yellow haze across the office. Joyce put her fingertips together and turned her gaze to a wall covered with framed photographs, newspaper clippings, and postcards; most of them yellowed, some new.

"When I got in charge of this place five years ago," she mused, "I was convinced I'd be murdered or raped -- or worse! -- before the end of my first week."

Abram coughed and drew his hand across his mustaches.

"I've never seen so many... or so modern... security measures gathered in such a small institution as this one. "Don't even think organizations like the CIA have updated their routines this far. How many patients did you say are under observation?"

"Six," Joyce stated without emotion.

She raised an index-finger to call for Abram's attention: "But not just any six patients, mind you!" She looked intensely at him, eyebrows raised. "Their relatives have arranged that their identities remain classified -- except the case of Parry, but I'll explain that later on -- and every one of them were distinguished members of society before ending up here.

Her brow wrinkled: "Am I boring you? It's so rare, me getting the chance to discuss the patients' cases with a colleague like this..."

"No, by all means go on. I'd be asking anyway."

"Our oldest patient," she continued, "has been here under observation since 1963. He was a member of the Kennedy clan's presidential campaign staff, and expected to get a House seat at a record low age.

"But shortly after the murder of JFK -- the same year I was born -- he suffered a breakdown and tried to shoot his wife dead. Now, normally in this type of case, the perpetrator immediately commits suicide after the crime... but he ran out of bullets and could be captured alive. For more than thirty years, a number of treatments and therapies have been attempted on him -- brain surgery's been totally banned by his relatives -- without result. He's now sixty-seven years, and will probably die of old age here."

Joyce sat quiet in the warm glow of the post-midday sun, looking with unseeing eyes in the direction of Abram, until he moved and raised his hand in a question.

"Are we talking about... a retarded patient?"

Joyce looked up from her thoughts.

"No, we're talking about a very, very intelligent patient. And he's just killed one human being."

Joyce slowly rose from her chair and walked over to a sixties-model refrigerator standing in a corner of the office. Opening it, she collected a lunchbox, a cream bottle, and closed the fridge with her foot. She sank into her chair and picked up a thermos bottle, which she put on her crammed desk together with the other things. She made an inviting gesture. Abram put up his palm, unsmiling.

"No, thank you, I'm not hungry."

Joyce leaned over the desk and began unpacking her lunch. Abram grabbed the arm-rests of his chair and, with somewhat greater effort than his colleague, stood up and walked around the desk to the windows. From the tall windows on the second floor, he could overlook the courtyard and lawn at the short side of the building. Suddenly, the intercom on Joyce's desk beeped. She swallowed a sandwich bite and pressed the answering button.

"Joyce speaking."

"We're starting today's exercise schedule," Mark's voice said. "First we take out Eliza, supervised by Quincy Filkmore, Kareem Lincoln, and Simon Bisley. Confirm?"

Joyce pulled out a schedule from her stacks and eyed it through.

"Confirmed. Stand by."

From outside came the muffled sound of the steel door opening and closing. Fascinated, Abram stared at an adult, pale woman being led down the steps by a tall male nurse in white clothes. Right behind him went another two heavy-bodied wardens carrying nightsticks. They spread out in different directions, while the pale woman walked out on the lawn followed by her warden. Joyce accompanied Abram by the window. The woman on the lawn was wandering around in wide circles; after a short while it became apparent that for each round, she was approaching the three-meter high barbed-wire fence. The wardens cautiously circled her in what looked like a measured, ritual dance.

"She has tried to escape before..?" Abram probed.

"Eight times, from five institutions under a period of four years, once from here. During those years she's killed two nurses, seriously injured a physician, and threatened the lives of several people.

"I'm not allowed to tell you her name; but you wouldn't believe me if I told you who she was known as -- and what crimes she's committed."

Joyce winced to herself. The woman on the lawn had moved to a distance of fifteen feet away from the fence. Abram gave Joyce a questioning look.

"Electrified," she assured him. "The only risk is that she'll try killing herself by clinging to the fence. Should that happen, the guards must beat her loose."

Joyce turned from the window and started to clear away the remains of her lunch from the desk. Then suddenly Abram looked upset, his moustache sprawling a little. He paced around the desk and stood face to face with Joyce, who attentively met his stern gaze. He leaned across, resting on his knuckles.

"Doctor Oregon. I've played along for long enough. Why am I being prevented from seeing my patient?"

Joyce rested her knuckles on the desk in an imitation of Abram's stance, so that her grave face came just a few inches from his own. It was the textbook trick of how to confront an intellectual opponent.

"Doctor Lemercier, I'm just trying to prepare you for how futile -- how hopeless -- it would be to try talking someone like Parry healthy. This is supposed to be a 'study', but you've revealed a therapeutic ambition in your letters, right? Do you know what we're actually doing with our patients here? We're trying to prevent them from escaping and hurting themselves, until they've grown too old and tired to try. The medication they're getting is just enough to make them sleep at night, and if we gave them more they'd be seriously brain damaged. This ain't no Prozac people."

Abram blinked twice.

"Thanks to that damned old movie, 'One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest', the politicians no longer dare allowing the mental institutions to perform the only working treatment -- frontal lobotomy. You're far from the first upper-class psychoanalyst who thinks he's the one who truly 'understands' Parry's problem. If it wasn't for your letter from the governor, I wouldn't..."

Joyce's head suddenly dropped, she held her hand to her forehead, and slumped back into her chair.

"I'm sorry," she mumbled, rubbing her temples with her thumb and index-finger. "We've had quite a difficult month before you arrived, all the safety routines must be rearranged before a visit."

Abram's brow wrinkled worriedly.

"No, I've been arrogant," he said in a low voice. "Pardon me." He extended his right hand in a gesture of reconciliation. "I've been reading about Parry's case for two years now, and I've been waiting long for this permit to see him."

He smiled courteously. Joyce gave him a tired smile and clasped his hand.

"Okay," she said, standing up, "let's prepare Parry for a new visitor."

Abram briefly glanced over Joyce's shoulder, down at the lawn outside. The three wardens were escorting the pale woman back to the door. Joyce started, and reached for the intercom.

"Mark? Let'em in, and abort the exercise schedule. I repeat, abort the exercise schedule. Initiate the new visiting routine for Parry. I'm coming down with Dr. Lemercier now. Over and out."

Abram stood with his briefcase in one hand, and let Joyce walk past him to the door. She opened the door and stepped aside. He chuckled and looked quizzically at her.

"Age before beauty," he said, bowing imperceptibly before going out into the stairwell. Joyce followed, after having locked the three locks of the office door.

4

Abram and Joyce were standing in the corridor outside the visiting room, on the first floor.

Simon Bisley, a tall male nurse with dark, short hair, a thin moustache and eyeglasses, came out of the visiting room. He was holding a metal detector. He nodded at Abram, who stepped inside. The padded steel door closed behind him with a muffled click. Abram looked around the white room. It was about ten feet wide, fifteen feet long, windowless, and lit by fluorescent tubes -- on his side of the room only. The room was split halfway by a thick plexiglass wall with rows of air holes at the top. On the other side of the glass wall was another padded door; nothing else, not even a ventilator.

Abram sat down on a worn wooden chair and looked up at the surveillance cameras in the ceiling. From one of them, Joyce's voice called out from a small loudspeaker.

"We're sending him in now, Abram. Are you sure you want to do this?"

Abram's hands trembled barely visibly, and his reply was forced: "Of course. Turn off all equipment like I've told you."

The little red lamps on the cameras went out. A couple of seconds passed, while Abram sat with his hands tightly folded above his lap; several times he began to run a hand across his moustaches, but restrained himself. The door on the opposite side opened. A pale man in a T-shirt, jeans, and loafers stood dead still in the doorway, his gaze shifting around the room. He saw Abram, fixed him with an intense stare, and walked carefully into his half of he room. The door closed and all was quiet. Lemercier stood up and walked over to the glass wall, stopping two feet from it. The man on the other side stood silent, incessantly staring at his face and person.

The man was of medium height, thin in an unhealthy way, and had light-red, stubby crew-cut hair. Bloodshot eyes glowered from an aggressive, angular face. The skin under his eyes was purple, making little irregular twitches as he began walking sideways left-right, like an animal poised for a leap. His bony fists hung tightly clenched along his sides; now and then his sharp, straight nose widened in a nervous sniffing.

The two men came to stand about six feet apart from each other. When Abram stroked his moustaches, his hand became wet with sweat. He took a deep breath, straightened his back, and decisively looked the other man in the eye.

"Hi, Patrick. I'm Abram Lemercier, a psychologist from Virginia." His voice was first unnaturally high, but quickly sank to a normal conversation level, as if unused to the acoustics of the room; it had a slight echo.

"What university?" Patrick's reply was hoarse and lightning-fast.

Abram backed a step, but kept his face level, his eyes steady.

"I'll be getting to that soon, Patrick. Right now I'd just like to talk a little, ask a few questions, and --"

"And to show your good will," Patrick cut off with hoarse scorn, "you've had the surveillance cameras shut off, right?"

He showed his teeth in a wide, wolfish grin. Abram hastily glanced up at the cameras in the ceiling. They were shut off. The staring man moved with more confidence, if still cautiously. Abram smiled with compressed lips as he turned to Patrick again; half angry, half amused.

"Okay, Dr. Rymowicz," he said grimly, "you're much too smart to let yourself be duped by formalities. Let me just fix one thing, and we can talk business."

He took off his tweed jacket and hung it over the optic surveillance camera, so that the microphone was covered. He turned to Patrick, who was now sneering at him.

"You might have microphones hidden in your clothes," he said, his voice somewhat less scornful.

Abram sighed, blinked twice, and started to take off his clothes. Half a minute later, his clothes and shoes lay crumpled together in a corner of the room, Abram standing as far away from them as possible. He folded his wiry arms over his paunch, looking at Patrick without fear. Patrick wasn't smiling any longer, but he glowered suspiciously at Abram's wrist.

"The watch," he hissed.

Abram gave Patrick a black look, took off his cheap plastic wristwatch, and smashed it under one of the chair's legs.

"Come closer to the glass," Patrick said shortly. They approached each other. When Abram pressed his ear to the glass, Patrick knocked at it, shaking his head in irritation.

He cupped a hand over his mouth, breathed at the glass, and wrote with his finger in the condensed droplets: GLASS CARRIES SOUND. The words faded almost as fast as they were written, but they were readable.

He erased the words with his forearm, breathed more "mist" onto the surface, and wrote: STAND IN THE WAY OF THE CAMERA

Patrick erased the text again, stared impatiently into Abram's resolute face, and waited. Abram frowned, looking down for a moment, before following Patrick's example.

5

WHY THEY CALL YOU PARRY?

Pause.

I'M PARANOID.

Pause.

WHY YOU HERE?

Pause.

TO STOP ME FROM KNOWING TOO MUCH.

Pause.

WHO WANTS THAT?

Pause.

IF I KNEW THAT pause I WOULDN'T BE pause HERE!!

Pause.

WHY'D YOU SHOOT ONE OF pause YOUR STUDENTS?

Pause.

HE WAS OUT TO GET ME.

Pause.

LATER. Pause. YOU BELIEVE ME pause IF I SAID pause I WORK FOR THE CIA?

Pause.

Patrick froze and scrutinized Abram's face. He pulled in air and wrote: MAYBE. AND?

Pause.

WE COULD HELP EACH OTHER.

Longer pause.

GET A SAFER ROOM.

Pause.

I WILL. YOU TRUST ME?

Pause.

NO. Then: I'LL WAIT.

Parry carefully rubbed out the writing on his side of the glass, and gestured at Abram to do likewise. So he did. Abram turned away from the patient, stepped over to the corner, and picked up his clothes.

6

After roughly ten minutes in the visiting room, Abram announced into the microphone that he was finished. The door opened from the outside; he stepped out into the corridor, where Simon and Joyce stood waiting. They looked at his crumpled tweed suit; Simon gave Joyce a knowing glance in Abram's direction, then he locked the padded steel door.

"How did it go," Joyce asked with no audible enthusiasm. Abram brushed off his creased clothes and straightened his bow tie; he gave her a confident smile.

"The first contact went better than I had hoped. I expect to have gained his confidence within a month."

"Abram," she said, "have you thought about the risks of playing along with the imagination of a paranoiac like this? Acting as if you were a secret agent, making insinuations about secrets, shutting off the surveillance, all that. And I'm worried for his sake, mind you." She added: "And the arranging of a special room for your conversations -- you still want that?"

"He asked for it, just like he's done to other therapists."

"It's nearly finished by now -- that's actually near the limits of our budget. After all, this is a private institution."

Abram made a deprecating gesture.

"Trust me, Joyce: no one is going to get harmed. Even if I won't succeed in shaking up his paranoia, this will help us learn much more of how his kind thinks." He added hastily: "Thereby not saying, that I wish to belittle my colleagues' work on his case."

Joyce raised a sarcastic eyebrow, spun around, and walked away with her hands in her coat pockets.

"Join me to the staff dining room," she said without looking back. Abram and the warden went with her.

7

WESTMOREHAM INSTITUTE
SEPTEMBER 9

A few days had passed.

The special room was located in the basement. Like the visiting room, it had a plexiglass wall; there were no cameras. It was almost the same size. But the sound-absorbing plates which covered walls, doors, and ceiling made it sound as if Abram and Parry were standing in a tiny wardrobe. A mattress dominated Parry's half of the room; otherwise it was empty. Abram was sitting on a stool with a briefcase in his lap, his eyes attentively fixed on Parry. Parry stood leaning against the glass wall in the middle of the room, looking back in distrust. Abram glanced down at his wrist -- where there was no wristwatch -- drew his hand over his beard, and opened his mouth.

"Right," Abram began. "We can hold our interviews here, and it's quite safe. Of course I have to talk to people outside, but I decide what they'll hear -- so it's all boils down to your trust in me. Okay?"

Parry blinked once.

"What I'm now about to say," Abram explained, "is our, unofficial version. There are two official versions of my work here. To Dr. Oregon, I've said that I'm nothing but a doctor of psychology, who's got a special permit from several authorities, to study a severe case of paranoid schizophrenia. I told her I use a technique of creating a false solidarity with the patient by suggesting to be a secret agent."

The purple skin under Parry's red eyes twitched at the phrase 'paranoid schizophrenia', but he stood tense and motionless.

"To my CIA superior, Ned Wilson, with whom I regularly communicate by a scrambled phone, I have said that I'm doing my official job as a psychologist, at the same time as I'm working on an important report. I'm continuously sending parts of the report to him by courier -- never by mail or FedEx."

Parry's pale eyebrows crowded restlessly over the root of his sharp nose. He listened.

"Here comes the real, unofficial version. Listen carefully."

Abram rose to his feet, holding his briefcase in one hand, shifting position as he talked.

"Parallel with my psychological case study of Patrick Rymowicz, which everyone knows of..."

He stopped momentarily, throwing a sideglance in Parry's direction.

"... I am also writing a continuing report for the CIA department for futurological studies. It contains different suggestions, for strategies to deal with the new political, military, and global threats which we might face after the end of the Cold War."

He walked up to the glass wall, the floor plates swallowing the sound of his shoes, so that his feet almost appeared to hover an inch above the floor.

"Do you realize the enormous difficulties we're having, rearranging the activity of the Company, rearranging our brains?" He made an impatient gesture at Parry. "Look at me! All the Company's chiefs grew up with the Cold War, and our accustomed habits of thinking make the Company slow in reacting to the new world order. We couldn't predict the failed Three Day Coup in the Soviet Union. And when the Soviet Union then suddenly ceased to exist, we stood there with our pants down.

"Saddam Hussein surprised us completely when he went into Kuwait! What saved us from World War Three was that he too was stuck in old habits. He intended to play off the U.S. against the Soviet Union in the U.N., and paralyze all intervention; but there was no Soviet Union anymore!"

Abram rested on the glass wall with his free hand and looked down upon his dark leather shoes, then up at Parry's concentrated, bony face. They were both sweating.

"When the next big crisis comes, the enemy -- be it China, the Arabs, secessionists within the nation, or someone else -- will have learned. We won't get a second lucky break. That's why I need the imagination of a younger person. Someone with a special talent for seeing patterns, where others just see chaos. Who may speculate freely without fear of losing his job. Someone who's got nothing to lose. Someone I could help back to freedom."

He paused for a breath. The air had grown palpably hot in the hermetically isolated room. Abram eased his collar and bow tie. Parry's T-shirt was dark with sweat, but he was yet standing still against the glass wall.

A few seconds passed, before he spoke in his hoarse voice: "This was most interesting... but there's a snag." Now completely serious, his wolf grin was gone. "Why," he said very slowly, very calmly, "should I risk trusting you? This special room was arranged pretty damn quickly. I've been here for years. I'm no longer allowed to read newspapers, order the books I want, watch TV or surf the Web. They're only letting me out for exercise once a week, drugging me to sleep every night; so I wake up every morning without having had any dreams, then I'll sit half-sleeping, waiting for being allowed to visit the bathroom while the wardens watch.

"The food is transported here from the town, and when it reaches my cell it has lost taste and smell. If I bribe the nurse with ten bucks he'll buy me a chocolate bar, but first I'll let him eat half of it and wait a week to see how he reacts, before tasting it myself. Then I'll get sure it was poisoned, and I throw it up immediately. Dr. Oregon hates me more than all the other five lunatics, serial killers and cannibals in this place; I've heard her say that I and the others should be lobotomized. Ask her. But you know what, Doctor Lemercier?"

Parry's voice was less hoarse now, but the more excited; his face redder.

"I want to stay here, because I know the outside world will explode under your feet any day! Give me one single reason for leaving my comparatively safe cell, to be hunted, found, and murdered in the normal world!!"

His voice rose to a rage. His clenched fists left sweat stains on the glass, which also showed spitmarks. Abram wiped his brow with his sleeve, lowered his eyebrows, looked at Parry's feet, crossed his arms.

After a minute he said: "To begin with..." He groped for the right words. "To begin with: nobody will ever know of your assistance, but of course that alone isn't enough to motivate anyone. Let's say that I'll arrange for you to stay in the special room for an unlimited time. I can give you access to television, newspapers, and all the books you ask for. You might even -- you might even study part of the classified material I'm using for my CIA report."

Abram ceased, and wiped his brow with a pained expression.

"Please let me open the air intake now," he gasped.

Parry wiped beads of sweat off the bridge of his nose with his fingers. He was swaying a little despite his sneer.

"Okay, if you won't speak. Oregon could be bugging us."

"Wait. I'll be right back."

Abram fumbled along the wall, found an air vent hidden by a piece of loose insulation material, opened it, went out into the basement and closed the door. There was a similar vent on Parry's side, but he ignored it.

When Abram came back into the special room a short while later, he was dumbstruck for a moment: Parry seemed to have disappeared. Then he saw the figure behind the curled-up mattress in the far corner of the room, and choked a laugh. He locked the room, shut the air vent, and held up the suitcase he had left there.

"In this briefcase there are no bombs, I can assure you. Where was I? Yes. Apart from anonymity, the special room, and free access to information, I can easily find up excuses for increasing your personal security. Make a list of the improvements you want, and I'll defend your demands with promises of increased donations. And if I haven't said it already, my official study of your case may lead to an eventual release, or at least better treatment. What've you got to lose?"

Abram threw out his arms, then let them hang along his sides, looking at the figure hiding behind the mattress. Parry slowly raised his head.

His bloodshot eyes were more nervous than angry, and he made a muted reply: "Okay... I'm prepared to play along -- but I'll retreat to my old cell whenever it becomes necessary!"

Abram sighed with relief and stepped toward the glass barrier.

"One more thing, Doc." Parry pushed away the mattress and stood up, remaining in the corner of the soundproof, echo-free room.

"Yes?"

"Do you think I'm crazy too?" Parry's voice almost trembled. Abram frowned as he was lost in his thoughts for a moment.

"Officially, yes. Unofficially... it doesn't really matter what I think, as long as the cooperation goes smoothly and discretely. Do you trust me?"

Parry's response was calm, his eyes relaxed somewhat.

"No. But that doesn't really matter either -- does it?" Some of the defiant scorn returned. See ya, Doc."

They did not say goodbye to each other.

8

CENTRAL WESTMOREHAM
SEPTEMBER 11

A motel-room.

"He's got his own rationalizations, Joyce. In the old days, miners used to bring birds with them, to check if the air was getting bad... so buy him a canary and a cat, then! Look up a garage sale, you'll surely find a cheap cage there. There couldn't happen anything worse than him eating the animals, _n'est-ce pas_? I'll take full responsibility. Yes. Yes. Thank you. Bye, Joyce."

Abram flung down the phone receiver.

"Bureaucratic connasse," he muttered, lapsing into his old French-Canadian dialect. Dressed in shirt, slacks, and socks, he reached for the opened suitcase on the bed and dug among his underwear, until he found his agency phone. He punched in a long number and pressed a scrambling button.

A short delay, and Ned Wilson's relaxed voice was heard: "Hello?"

Abram's brow wrinkled habitually, but he assumed a hearty tone: "Hi, Ned! It's Abram. How's things in Virginia?"

"Ah´ didn't expect to hear from you so soon, Abram! Just fine, thank you. The National Security Council has just received copies of the first part of your report, and they were eager to read the rest. How far have you come?"

Abram tried to suppress a proud grin, which resulted in a grimace.

"It's too early to give a definite deadline right now, but the work is going forward. As you know I'm also busy with a particularly difficult patient... and I owe you one for opening a few doors for me in that work."

"You know the Company always stands by its employees. Now don't take it as me tryin' to stress you, Abram. But ah'm really full of expectations."

"Thanks. I promise I won't disappoint you and the Security Council."

"That's fine. And remember: Should there be anything, don't hesitate t'call me. Good luck with Parry!"

"Thanks, Ned. Catch you later."

He put the phone back into his suitcase, reached for the phone on the bedside table -- and froze, confused. The next instant he shook his head, so that his long neck hair was ruffled.

"I did let Ned have a brief look at the file on Patrick," he warned himself. "He must've seen it then. This is no time for getting suspicious."

He picked up the receiver, and a note from the nearby desk, and punched the number written there. After three signals, one 'please wait' message, and half a minute's elevator music, a shrill male voice answered.

"Trudeberry here, who am I speaking to?"

"Principal Trudeberry? How do you do, this is Dr. Abram Lemercier. I hold psychology lectures at schools and universities in Virginia. Have we met, by any chance?"

"No... no, I don't think so. What... what can I do for you?"

Abram made a polite cough.

"Er, the thing is that I'm investigating a patient who used to be a teacher at your university, about five years ago."

"That was during the previous administration, I'm afraid."

"Yes, but perhaps you've heard of my patient anyway? His name's Patrick Rymowicz, he used to teach logic and philosophy..."

For a few moments Trudeberry was silent; when his voice returned, it was upset and frightened.

"I have no idea who you're talking about, and I want to ask you not to disturb me again -- I'm a very busy man. Goodbye."

Trudeberry disconnected the call. Abram gave a resigned sigh and hung up the phone. He picked up the Yellow Pages from the bedside table, put it in his lap, and flipped through it until he found what he was looking for. He dialed the number and got through immediately.

"Tourist Information Bureau, Southeast Washington, can I help you?"

Abram put on a formal tone: "Yes. Could you please tell me where to find small civilian airfields in the vicinity of Westmoreham County, Miss?"

"Just a moment, please."

9

The Learjet was nearly empty, save for Abram, a few Congressmen, and another Agency man. He slept through most of the flight.

10

CORTEZ STATE UNIVERSITY
SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA
SEPTEMBER 12

The federally funded and run university had recently had its name changed to "Cortez" after protests from student organizations, who claimed the old name was "Anglo-centric and discriminated the large mass of Latin-American students." The new name sign at the campus entrance was decorated with an image of Aztec priests and helmeted Conquistadors shaking hands.

Abram stepped out of the taxicab and paid the driver, who immediately drove away from the university's main entrance. He was perspiring heavily in the hot midday sun and wore his jacket, coat, and hat under one arm, briefcase under the other. A swift stream of young students, tanned and thinly dressed, passed by the pale middle-aged traveler; some stared after him in amusement when he went up the wide, low stairs and into the shadow of the main building. It took Abram fifteen minutes and some questions to find the principal's office. It was on the second floor, equipped with a steel door and opaque bullet-proof windows. In the surrounding corridor several bullet-holes had recently been filled with mortar -- grey spots in the pastel yellow paint.

On the steel door hung a sign reading: VISITORS ARE REQUESTED TO LOOK INTO THE CAMERA FOR IDENTIFICATION -- barely intelligible under the graffiti. Abram looked up at the camera; the door clicked and slid open automatically. He went inside, and a security officer in a beige shirt got up from the desk by the entrance; two secretaries peeked at Abram behind desks crammed with paperwork and computer equipment. He gave them a friendly nod.

"He's expecting me," Abram told the guard. "Tell him that Patrick will be in the papers by tomorrow," he explained casually.

The guard spoke into his small cell-phone, turned his swarthy, searching face to him and nodded approval: "You can come in now, sir."

Abram went over to the heavy door marked G. TRUDEBERRY, UNIVERSITY PRINCIPAL. Before he had reached the brass door-knob, the door opened with a buzz and a click. The principal's private office was clearly designed to appear old, despite the fact that the rest of the university didn't seem to have aged more than ten years. Dark panels of imitation oak covered those walls that were not occupied by well-filled bookcases; two principals' portraits hung on the walls; a wide panorama window overlooking central San Diego was fitted with false windowbars. In front of the window, principal Trudeberry sat behind a massive dark wooden desk. He grabbed the armrests of his wide leather chair and looked anxiously at Abram's grave, tired face.

"What do you want?" Trudeberry asked, his voice almost a falsetto. He was a middle-aged, thin-lipped man with watery eyes and a deep tan; his hair was blond and sunbleached. Though the air-conditioner was whispering by the window, he was beginning to sweat in his light blue linen suit. Abram decisively walked over to the desk and looked down at the sitting man.

"I'm Dr. Abram Lemercier," he said calmly. "I'm not a journalist who can tarnish the unversity's reputation, but I know a couple of those -- real oldtime muckrakers. Should I or they ask a few questions about Patrick Rymowicz?"

"Excuse me for my rude behavior, Dr. Lemercier," Trudeberry whined. "You see, that was a terribly tragic and embarrassing affair, and we've had one hell of a problem with the media since then. You do understand?"

Abram did not change his grave expression, but nodded slowly. The principal looked more hopeful.

"The police made a thorough investigation, so I can't see what further information I could bring you..."

"With due respect to the police," Abram said, "there are personal aspects of Parr... Patrick's case, that might have been lost during the official investigation. Did he have any friends among his colleagues or students?"

Trudeberry pulled back a strand of hair from his sweaty brow, and started to work the computer on his desk. Abram walked over to his side and studied the text columns passing by on the large monitor. Trudeberry brightened up and pointed at a name list on the screen.

"There we have it! Rymowicz was a loner, quite impopular with the other teachers; but several of his students almost worshipped him like a guru! I'll give you a printout of this list --" -- he activated the printer -- " -- of everyone who went to his lectures the same year as..."

He fell silent and gave Abram a frightened glance. The printer in the corner stopped buzzing, and Trudeberry hurried to pull out the sheet and hand it to Abram.

"Thank you very much," Abram said, folding the list and putting it inside his jacket, "you've been of great help. I assure you that my study is not intended for the media." Trudeberry shook his hand with obvious relief, and Abram picked up his briefcase.

He halted in the doorway and turned his head towards the principal who was standing by an open bookcase, pouring himself a drink.

"By the way... have you ever met Patrick yourself?"

Trudeberry stopped his arm with the glass to his lips, looking away from Abram: "Yes... yes, but I never got to know him. There was something intimidating about him, even before his breakdown... he had a way of staring at you, you know? As if he knew something really bad about you."

Abram nodded.

"Yes," he half mumbled, "I've seen it myself. He's still staring, Trudeberry. Could you tell me what he's seeing, that we can't see?"

When the confused principal turned about to speak, Abram had already left. He hurried down the stairs, past scores of busy students returning from the lunch break. Most of them did appear Latin-American; many of the male students wore a hat or buttoned shirts, as did some of the girls.

Abram was halfway to the main entrance, when he slowed his steps and got a puckish glint in his eyes. He lifted his hat over his graying head, pulled it down over his forehead, and put on an indifferent face. His coat and jacket slung over one shoulder, one hand in his pocket, and swinging his briefcase in the other hand, he strolled through the stream of young students and out into the sun. A few youngsters shouted cheerfully after him, but he ignored them.

11

The phone booths on the sidewalk outside were all smashed.

Abram walked into one of the graffiti-scribbled booths and stood there. He pulled out his agency-issue phone and punched in the number of the person on the top of his list: Bettina Avarez, San Diego. There was a busy tone. He dialed the next number: Giordano Bruno, Los Angeles.

After four signals, a young male voice with almost no accent answered: "Who is it?"

"My name's Lemercier. May I talk to Giordano Bruno?"

The voice at the other end slowly breathed out, then in.

"What's your business with him?"

"Tell him that it's very important that I may talk to him. It concerns a fellow acquaintance of ours -- Rymowicz."

The voice suddenly sounded more interested.

"Do you know Dr. Rymowicz? Where is he?"

"We can't talk about it on the phone," Abram said with exaggerated gravity. "Could we meet? I'm in San Diego now, but I could be in L.A. in less than three hours."

"It's a few minutes past one... Could you be here after eight o'clock tonight?"

"Yes. Thank you."

The voice cut off the call loudly. Abram tucked away the name list, and extracted a Greyhound Bus timetable from his pockets. He made another call, for a cab. Less than two minutes later, a YellowCab braked at the phone booths. Abram opened the backseat door and got inside.

"Where to?"

"Bus central. Fifty bucks if you step on it."

The taxicab left the campus with a roaring start.

12

Abram was sitting far back in the half-filled Greyhound bus.

Dusk was falling outside, and thousands of points of lights lit up across the darkening coastline. A TV screen above the driver's seat showed a live news broadcast from a foreign conflict. Abram followed the news with eyes half shut, until it broke for commercials.

He took up a small black device from the briefcase at his feet: a pocket secretary, the size and shape of a large cell-phone. It could take dictation, write his words down, and store them on a minidisc for his laptop computer -- on a bus ride, it was more comfortable than a laptop. There were buttons for the basic functions START, HOLD, NEW, ERASE, quotation mark, period, comma, paragraph, colon, and two scrolling buttons.

He switched it on, put it to his mouth and spoke softly into the microphone piece: "Early draft of introduction to 'Parry -- A Study in Persecution Mania', version two." Abram tapped a button and started the next paragraph. "In the past decade, a few studies have been made of paranoia as a social phenomenon, concentrating on the American postwar period."

He pressed HOLD for a moment, tugged at his beard, then went on.

"Bensonhurst and others have proposed the theory that the paranoid condition is normal for the late industrial society, and will only seek out new projections after the breakdown of Soviet Communism."

Pause.

"The case of Patrick Rymowicz, which occurred soon after the dissolution of Eastern Germany, may shed new light on how the delusions of the paranoid patient are affected by outer political processes -- though this does not apply in most cases."

Abram paused and looked away at the bus TV screen: a live broadcast was showing how gunfire, street riots, and fires were ruining the eastern parts of Los Angeles. Martial law had been proclaimed at night, and units of the National Guard were being transported into the afflicted area. Several bus passengers cursed the news out loud; an old lady walked up to the bus driver and talked to him.

Abram frowned and looked thoughtful for a few moments, then resumed his dictation: "In the near future, social engineering will probably be able to treat, perhaps even cure, the collective disturbances -- "

He pressed the ERASE button on the device's keypad, and a blinking cursor erased the words "collective disturbances" from the little green screen.

"...the mass psychological phenomena that may appear in the dynamic, post-industrial society," he corrected himself.

Pause.

"Parry's case is a step toward this goal. To quote Edmund Muskie, Hubert Humphrie's candidate for vice president in the 1968 election, as I remember hearing him... 'I think the great issue for America, as in the past, is whether Americans can trust each other... between people of different races and national origins... whether the American people will decide to trust each other. We will go towards a united country, or we will go towards a divided country, where people will fear each other.'"

Abram switched off his secretary and glanced at the digital watch in the far end of the bus ceiling. The red digits read 18:47 PM. With difficulty, he heaved himself up from the seat and walked through the aisle to a soft drink and sandwich machine. He bought a can and a sandwich with his American Express card.

As he picked up his purchases, a voice from behind him caused him to stiffen: "It's what I've been saying for a long time, it's all the Mexicans flooding the country! They might as well let it burn, till all those taco-eaters've been smoked out of California."

Abram turned around and began to protest: "What kind of racist drivel is --"

He ceased abruptly. The source of the outburst, a middle-aged black man in a dark suit, gave him a sour look.

"Yes?"

"Excuse me," Abram muttered in a broken voice and headed back to his seat.

13

MAYWOOD
EAST CENTRAL LOS ANGELES
SEPTEMBER 12

The night sky was illuminated by the smoke from the districts to the east, casting an orange shimmer over the streets where the taxicab dropped off Abram.

One block away, a couple of palmtrees were burning in solitude, like huge bent candles. He hurried across a parking lot, looking nervously in all directions. He half-ran to the two-story block of flats, up the stairway, and stopped breathless outside the door. He supported himself against the balcony parapet and caught his breath, before knocking at the door.

The window next to the door lit up, and someone pulled aside a curtain's edge. A small periscope glistened into view and disappeared -- a rattling of keys and lock-chains followed. Suddenly the door slammed open, and the lights went out inside. Abram gazed fearfully into the dark, his back against the parapet.

"Come on in!" a voice hissed from the darkness.

"I'm Lemercier... are you Bruno?" Abram managed to gasp.

"Yes, get the hell inside. They can spot us from the street!"

Abram glanced over his shoulder, held the briefcase against his chest, and threw himself into the dark doorway. The door closed loudly behind him and the lights were turned on. He got to his feet with a speed that belied his age, spun around with the briefcase held as a shield -- and stood facing Giordano Bruno, who was locking the door with several keys. Giordano was a crew-cut Asian in his twenties, holding a sawed-off shotgun by one stringy arm. He wore army boots, gray camouflage pants, and a black T-shirt -- plus a huge survival knife in a shoulder-holster. He picked up an iron-bar and placed it across the door by two cramp-irons. With his hard eyes fixed on Abram, he finished the locking procedure. Giordano took a step forward and raised his shotgun in Abram's direction.

"Got I.D.?" he asked.

Abram fumbled inside his jacket and got out his driver's license, his membership card for the psychologists' association, and an old bank ID. Giordano studied them closely before returning them. His eyes narrowed, looking at Abram again.

"A shrink, huh? What've you got to do with Dr. Rymowicz?"

Abram slowly backed into the room, following the gun barrels with his eyes, without lowering the bag he held before him.

"Take away the gun," he said slowly. "I am unarmed. I came here to ask a few questions; but if you're going to threaten me, I will leave right now."

"Okay, but no tape recorders. Hang up the coat and case over there." Giordano pointed his gun at a corner. "But first -- spread'em."

He searched Abram and found no weapons; then he seemed to relax. While Abram put away his coat and briefcase, Giordano switched on the TV set and went out into the kitchen. Abram sat down in the combined TV- and living-room sofa. His gaze wandered across the untidy room. The walls were lined with film posters showing heavily armed, karate-kicking men; next to them, big posters of automatic weapons held by large-breasted women. He chuckled. When Giordano returned from the kitchen with two beer cans, Abram had begun watching the TV news broadcast -- the reports from the riots continued to arrive from airborne reporters. He looked up.

"It's already begun, what Rymowicz warned us about," Giordano said as he handed Abram the other beer can.

Abram asked: "Did he ever tell his students that... 'the outside world will explode under your feet any day'?"

Giordano stared excitedly at Abram, and slumped down in an armchair.

"That's exactly what he said! He said we would soon see a second civil war, and that we'd better choose the winning side, or leave the country." Then his enthusiasm changed into aggressive suspicion: "What are you doing to him, anyway?" Giordano gestured with his can, spilling drops of beer on the table between them.

"Calm down, Giordano. I took on Patrick's case just a week ago, and I'm trying to see that he gets a better treatment than he's received for the last couple of years." Giordano attentively listened to Abram's words. "But in order to convince the medical authorities of that, I must be able to prove that he's more sane than they have assumed."

Giordano interrupted him indignantly: "Dr. Rymowicz is not crazy! They're just trying to break him, like they did when he was teaching at the university." He drank some beer and wrinkled his forehead.

Abram cocked his head and let his fingertips touch, while he leaned forward in Giordano's direction.

"I think we both want to help Dr. Rymowicz," he said in a sincere tone. "And you, or the others in his last class, might give me important facts that the police have missed. How well did you know each other? Did you know the student who... lost his life in that incident?"

Giordano's slumped head shot up. "What've the other students told you?" he said nervously.

Abram calmed him: "You're the first one I got in touch with."

14

Giordano rose from the armchair and started walking restlessly about the living-room.

Behind the drawn curtains came the beating noise of a helicopter flying by at low altitude. He gestured with his hands, stooping, as if he tried to shake out words.

"I think..." he said, "...no, I know that most people hated or feared Rymowicz. No-one likes a smartass. It hurt just to hear him speak, you know?"

Abram nodded.

"I was living here then, commuting between L.A. where I work, and San Diego. Just to hear his lectures in logic and philosophy. I've got several tape recordings."

Giordano walked over to a stereo cupboard and put a cassette in the tape deck.

"This is from one of his last lectures. I've listened to it almost every day since," he eagerly explained, turning on the stereo. Abram sat up in amazement, when he heard the recorded voice of Patrick Rymowicz, five years younger and considerably stronger. He spoke fast, but with utter clarity of tone...

"The official philosophy of America was formulated in this beautiful way by Abraham Lincoln -- one of the few Presidents who shouldn't have been shot... " (Laughter from the class) "...during our first, great civil war...

"'Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure...' A few wars later, in the year 1948, Norman Mailer formulated America's unofficial philosophy in this beautiful way: 'I HATE EVERYTHING THAT IS NOT MYSELF.'

"To understand these two contradictory quotes, is the key to understanding American politics. Already when the Founding Fathers laid the groundwork of our constantly re-interpreted Constitution, they must have realized the hopelessness of their intentions: to create a society where 'all men' -- they probably meant all 'men' -- are 'created equal', in a society which praised individual competition above everything else. A funny thing is that the phrase 'All men are created equal' can also be interpreted as 'All men are created identical' -- which sounds a little unrealistic. By the way, I want everyone to hand in a one-page analysis of that particular phrase by next week."

(Murmuring of sighs from the class)

"So: in a violent frontier culture, which sets up incompatible ideals of individualism and collective equality... how do the leaders go about accomplishing this ideal state?" (Pause.) "The only solution is to develop political schizophrenia: to officially praise the values one simultaneously tramples in the dirt, and especially by trying to circumvent the power-dividing institutions -- Congress, the Supreme Court, and the media.

(Background noise of forceful chalk scribblings against a blackboard)

"Our latest Presidents have been revealed as being either hypocrites, liars, or conspirators -- but this can be blamed on media attention, rather than the Presidents becoming more dishonest. They have all shown signs of this political schizophrenia. Several of them have tried to form secret, non-authorized government organizations to realize their goals. Let us dissect --"

"Hold it! Stop the tape for a moment!"

Abram had leaped up from the sofa. Giordano obeyed. Abram peered perplexedly at thin air, tugging at his beard.

"This is incredible," he murmured. "I never got to know there were recordings of his lectures. Rymowicz burned all his writings just before his..." He looked at Giordano, who were standing by the stereo deck. "Have you... is there any tape from that day he finally..?"

"No!" Giordano retorted angrily, but with a hint of insecurity in his eyes. "I destroyed it, and said nothing to the police, or to all those shrinks and journalists who came asking questions. They just would've distorted his words, to make him sound like a psycho killer; and Dr. Rymowicz would've thought I was on their side too. I mean, there were a lot of witnesses in the auditorium, okay? The police didn't need the tape, okay?"

He looked to the floor.

"I know," Abram said in a lower voice, "I've read the reports of his trial. Still... how did he dare saying such things during a philosophy lecture? When I was young, not even the teachers who really were Marxists would be so brazen."

Giordano grinned at him: "Simple. It was listed among the 'junk courses', like 'Practical Witchcraft'. Most of his students had chosen his course to fill their schedule, so they weren't listening to his words, they just read the books. And most of us were so bad at English language, they barely followed half of what he said. Cortez State is one of the lowest-ranking unversities in the country. He used his time to talk about other things he thought we should know... 'I want to learn America's new Morlocks how the country really works,' he said."

"That sounds a bit right-wing. Was Rymowicz a racist?"

"Naah, he meant it satirically, and we understood that! He said several times that American politics was one big joke, 'but you'll die laughing.'"

Giordano quoted his teacher with total lack of humor. Abram walked to the wide back window, and peeked out through the chink between the frame and the blinds. From outside came the distant sounds of police sirens, helicopters, and trucks passing by; sporadic gunshots cracked; fires were still burning in the east.

Still looking out, he asked: "That student who was shot to death... Luis Bonzalero. How would you explain that?"

Giordano crossed his arms over his chest, clenching his fists so that the knuckles went white; he spat out his answer.

"Bonzo? Shit, everyone knew he was the worst drugdealer in Cortez State! Principal Trudeberry and all the teachers were scared shitless of him and his gang, 'Los Terminators'. Rymowicz was the only teacher who dared talk back to him."

"Tell me about it."

While Abram remained motionless by the window, Giordano started pacing across the room again: "Well, one or two weeks before... the gun went off, Bonzo'd threatened Rymowicz. Bonzo was always sitting in the back of the auditorium and sleeping during his lectures, when he wasn't smoking weed and crank. Rymowicz used to ignore him, but this particular day Bonzo was in a bad mood and tried to interrupt... I've got a tape of it here somewhere."

Giordano picked out another cassette from the cupboard, switched tapes, rewound the tape a bit, and pressed PLAY. Once more Rymowicz' former voice came from the loudspeakers, sharp and with a hint of suppressed anger:

"...which has created a psychological empty space. The official America unconsciously craves a group it can make invisible, and new groups are constantly trying to get a place in the America made visible. Not because the invisible groups in any way should be 'morally superior', that's beside the point. It is only a question of being seen, because by being seen, one gains influence over the mass media, the..."

Another voice on the tape echoed through the auditorium. Rymowicz ceased speaking for a moment, then went on:

"By being seen, one gains influence over..."

"Hey, Doc! I asked you a question, comprende?"

"Yes, Luis?"

"Are you trying to tell us that we're not being seen, Doc? That Los Terminators ain't the coolest hombres in San Diego? Que pasa?"

"Thank you for making that important question, Luis. I will try to answer it the best I can. Say, how many students are gathered here, right now?

"Ten, twenty, thirty... say, forty students, of which thirty-five are first- or second-generation immigrants from Latin America. According to the new statistics, perhaps one of you has got a decent chance of becoming an MTV popstar, a local politician, or the like.

"Between three and four of you will get AIDS, about ten of you will be full-time drug addicts. At least three of you will be killed or injured in gangwars or drug-related crimes. One of you will, according to statistics, surely be seen on TV -- after being mowed down by a rival gang. Those of you who don't wish to become part of those statistics, perhaps you'd like to pay attention now?"

"You're deadmeat, Doc! Deadmeat!!"

"Thank you, I'll make a note of that. Where were we?"

Giordano switched off the stereo. Abram looked over his own shoulder at him, wrinkling his forehead in sombre seriousness. His forehead was shiny with sweat.

"Did you witness Bonzo saying that?" He nearly whispered.

"No, I was sitting in the front row with my back against him. But several people saw him point at Rymowicz and pretending to shoot him."

Giordano shaped his hand into an imaginary pistol and pointed it at Abram's head on a stretched-out arm.

"When a gangleader makes that sign," he said, "it means the same as a death sentence. Didn't the law report say that?"

"No... and none of the questioned witnesses mentioned that gesture," Abram muttered. "Or Bonzo's words."

"They were probably scared of the gang," Giordano said bitterly. "But of course, you who come from private schools don't know what it's like here," he added with contempt.

Abram gave him a grim look, yawned, held his wrist up to his nose and squinted at his new paper-and-plastic wristwatch.

"Time's flying. Is there any hotel nearby that I can take a cab to? I've got more questions, but we can go through them tomorrow."

Giordano stared disbelievingly at Abram's sunken figure, his hands on his hips: "Are you crazy? There ain't a single taxidriver who'll go out tonight!"

He pointed at the TV screen. They saw a fire brigade, trying to reach the fires. A stone-throwing mob was pressing it backward.

"When I was studying in Virginia in the Sixties," Abram muttered to himself, "there were nights like this one. But I thought we'd left all that behind. Why does it never stop? Where did we go wrong?"

For a moment Giordano was looking at the old man with what seemed like pity. He went to the stereo cupboard again, took out a tape, went up to Abram and offered it to him.

"Take this one, I've already got a copy. It's from his penultimate lecture, where he summed up most of what he'd been saying before. But don't tell anyone where you got it."

Abram took the cassette with a tired smile. He straightened himself, hid a yawn with his hand, and put the tape in his pocket.

"Thanks. But I still think I'll have to leave now. I'll call or write to you later."

He shook Giordano's hand, and went off to pick up his coat and briefcase. As Abram moved toward the door, Giordano suddenly looked worried. He picked up the shotgun from the floor, and pointed it at the door while he was lifting away the iron-bar and locking up.

"You sure you want to walk to the hotel? It's one block further up, I can drive you. Car's just outside."

Abram glanced at the armed man, then squinted in the direction of the curtained window. He made a silent gesture at Giordano. The young man reached for the switch and the room went dark. They both peered out through the front window curtains. The orange firelight was still flickering at the eastern horizon... but stronger, closer. In the silence, a faint crackle of shoes against asphalt sounded outside -- then suddenly, a crash and a burst of light from the parking-lot, followed by a blast that rattled the windowpanes.

Giordano snarled: "Shit! My car!"

He threw open the door and rushed outside. Abram impulsively followed one step behind.

15

Outside, a small band of people were raiding the parking-lot; one car had been set on fire with a molotov-cocktail and exploded. The flames threw dancing shadows over the neighbourhood, as they spread to adjacent cars.

Giordano, seeing this, shouted a foul curse in Spanish that made the looters stop in their tracks.

He stood on the balcony parapet, and fired his double-barrel shotgun in the air. Several looters turned and ran away. Two of them had just managed to break into a car and start the engine. It bumped against other cars as it roared off across the parking-lot. Giordano pushed the speechless Abram aside and locked the apartment door. Then he hurried down the stairway, opening the barrels and loading a new shell. Abram hesitated for a second, then rushed after.

"Wait," he gasped, "they're running away!"

"I gotta move the car to a safer place," Giordano said tensely, striding toward the parking-lot. "Those were just frontrunners. In a minute the riot will be here!"

A few seconds later, they were sitting in Giordano's tiny Nissan as he swerved backward, then forward and out into the street. Abram sat in the backseat -- Giordano's shotgun was taking up the other front seat.

"Could you take me to the airport?" Abram asked, pale in the face. "I must go there anyway, and it's probably safer too."

Giordano looked at Abram by the rear-view mirror.

"Okay... that'll cost you fifty bucks." He grinned. "I am a taxidriver, but I usually don't work riot-time."

Abram blinked rapidly several times, unsmiling -- and was thrown off balance, when the car skidded left to avoid rioters on the street. Giordano honked the horn, and something bumped against the roof as they raced past the raging crowd. They drove past a few empty, littered city blocks -- only a handful of speeding cars were out in the area -- and made a turn up north, onto the Long Beach Freeway. Giordano scanned the landscape.

"Getting to the airport shouldn't take too long, unless we run into any troops. Seems those military exercises weren't a waste after all."

He sank back in his seat and looked over his shoulder at Abram, who held a hand over his chest, leaning on the briefcase in his lap. Abram was breathing with effort.

"You okay, old man?"

"Yeah," he wheezed. "Thanks." Giordano looked thoughtful for a while.

He asked: "You know, you never asked me what Rymowicz told us on that lecture when he shot Bonzo."

Abram rubbed his moustaches with a handkerchief, then wiped his face.

"I've already read the testimonies from that day, and they don't seem to fit in with the facts you gave me. What do you think?"

"You know what I think?" Giordano said. "Dr. Rymowicz knew Bonzo was going to ice him, but if he'd reported him to the cops, Bonzo's gang would've fixed him anyway. Rymo's only chance of getting rid of Bonzo and surviving it, was to act crazy -- so that he wouldn't end up among Bonzo's friends in prison."

Abram looked into the rear-view mirror and caught Giordano's hard eyes; his own were haggard.

"An interesting theory... but I honestly don't think the authorities would believe me if I told them."

He stared forward -- avoiding the shotgun with his eyes? -- and added: "For Rymowicz' own sake, I would keep such theories to myself."

16

LOS ANGELES INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT

Giordano's car stopped in front of the police and National Guard control, at one entrance to the airport area. The traffic was lining up ahead of them. Abram got out of the car and gave Giordano a 100-dollar bill.

"Keep the change," he said with a grim face.

He leaned into the side window and asked: "A personal question. Why're you named Giordano Bruno? You don't look Italian to me."

Giordano's obscured face gave out a high, jittery laugh: "I was born in Vietnam, adopted by the Brunos. They thought the name Giordano was fitting, like that guy who was burned at the stake in the sixteenth century, you know?"

Abram grunted: "Yeah, I know. Don't end up like him."

He turned, waved over his shoulder, and started walking toward the airport entrance.

17

SEPTEMBER 13

- Hello?

- Hi, my name is Abram, Abram Lemercier. May I speak to Bettina Avarez?

- Una momento, por favor. Bettina!

- Hello?

- Hi, I'm Dr. Abram Lemercier, from Easton University in Virginia. May I have a word with you for five minutes?

- ...Okay.

- I'm a psychologist, and I'm studying the case of a mental patient who once was a teacher at Cortez State -- Patrick Rymowicz. I know you attended his classes some years ago, is that right?

- ...Yeah.

- Would you be prepared to answer a few quick questions about him? It's nothing for the public or the media, I assure you -- you will be completely anonymous.

- ...I see. What do you want to know?

- What was your impression of Rymowicz? Was he a good teacher?

- Wait, I'll need to think about that before I answer. Rymowicz was... I mean, he was obviously loco. Totally mental, he just showed it more in the final lectures before he... you know.

- I know. Please go on.

- He was probably the worst philosophy teacher we've ever had. He ignored the textbooks, except for when he used them to "prove" some weird statement he was making. He never admitted he could be wrong, never listened to our questions. I passed the course by sticking to the books; I didn't care to write down the bullshit he put us through. But he sure could be funny, in a weird kinda way. Sometimes you wouldn't know if he was making fun of you, or if he was being totally serious.

- I see. Did he ever threaten the students or the teachers, become aggressive or... sexually harassing anyone?

- We used to joke about how dangerous Rymowicz really was, about how one day he would... you know, explode and burn down the campus or something... he never really threatened anyone, though. Sexual harassments..? (Laughter)

Depends on what you mean. He did give the cutest girls looks sometimes, but who could say what he meant by that? The way he gave people those strange looks, it could just as well mean he wanted to kill you. Some people thought he was gay, because he never had any company. But I think he was just too weird to have any girlfriends.

- Could you remember if his eyes were bloodshot?

- Oh, man! When he wasn't listening, we used to call him "The Demon"! He couldn't be getting much sleep, with those eyes. There was a rumor that he had some eye disease that made it difficult for him to blink -- I don't know.

- Were you ever afraid of Rymowicz?

- Yeah, many times. And... and I had a crush on him, too. Those sharp teeth of his made him look a little like a vampire -- you know, I was a young girl and the idea seemed romantic in a kinda scary way. (Laughter)

- Ha ha... okay, I don't think I need to ask you more. Thank you very much for your help.

- Don't mention it. By the way... how is he now?

- Well... I can't go into details of course, but he's alive and relatively well, regarding the circumstances.

- You wouldn't know his address, would you?

- I'm sorry, but I really shouldn't give away his address.

- Okay... can I give you a letter to him, though?

- Well, I guess that would be all right. Send the letter, inside a sealed envelope to my name, Abram Lemercier, at Easton University in Norfolk, Virginia. The letter will be forwarded to me, and I'll hand it to him.

- Great. Thanks! Bye, Doctor Lemercier.

- Thank you for your help. Goodbye.

18

WESTMOREHAM INSTITUTE
SEPTEMBER 14

After once more having passed the gates, opened the entrance door with his personal passcard, been let inside the main building by Mark Fosse, walked up the stairs to the second floor and knocked on Joyce Oregon's door, been scrutinized through a peephole and waited for the three locks to be opened, Abram could enter Joyce's office and say hello to her.

It was pitch-dark outside, and squalls were tearing at the tall windowpanes. He politely tilted his hat upward.

"Good evening, Joyce," he said with a sniffle; his his nose and cheeks were red with cold. "Do you always work this late?" He smiled at her as she indifferently locked the door.

"Only when my hands are full," she replied. "Parry's been pulling through some of his bizarre demands while you've been away, and I need you to look'em over before you see him."

Without looking him in the eye, she walked to her desk and handed over a bundle of clipped papers, holding them somewhat like a bag of garbage.

Abram skimmed the list, mumbling to himself: "Better temperature control for the special room, check; a kitten for sampling the food, check; a canary for air control, check... a lie detector?"

He glanced up at Joyce, who stood folding her arms, waiting for his next question.

"Could you arrange a lie detector for him?" he said.

"You take full responsibility, remember? We wanted your explicit approval before buying one," she said dryly.

Abram rubbed his red nose, looking doubtful: "We'll wait with the detector for a while, I think." He continued on down the list: "Kevlar vest -- too expensive. Gas mask, first aid -- okay, maybe later. Gun and rubber bullets -- impossible. He must've understood that."

Joyce sniffed at him, and said: "Parry always tests exactly how far he can go. If you want my opinion, he's going to try another escape."

Abram gave her a shrewd look: "Don't be too sure about that. Is he ready for the special room now?"

19

Almost simultaneously, Abram and Parry walked through their respective doors, and across to the plexiglass wall in the middle of the echo-free room.

Parry seemed less thin, and had a somewhat healthier color below his eyes. His eyes were just as bloodshot, though, and the wolf grin was still there. He stared expectantly at Abram, who managed a smile.

"Good to see you, Patrick! You look healthier. Is everything to your satisfaction?"

Parry stood motionless, and replied: "The air vent, Doc! Do I have to remind you every time?"

Abram's smile disappeared, but he went and sealed the air intake on his side of the chamber.

Parry looked more content, and added: "It doesn't get as hot in here as in the beginning, since they fixed the basement system. We've got a few minutes of talking, before we have to take a break for new air. I don't want to suffocate my new pets."

He went over to a corner of the room, where an old-fashioned wrought-iron bird cage stood on a stand. Next to it was a basket, a box of kitty-litter, and a water-bowl. An empty paper plate lay by the basket. The little bird in the cage started chirping, as Parry squatted down over the basket and picked up a tiny, dark-gray kitten. Holding it gently in his arms, he went closer to the glass wall.

"I call her Joyce," he said, stroking the cat's head until it started to purr with its eyes closed. "Was thinking of asking them to send in a hooker from town; but of course Dr. Oregon would never agree on that." He made a wide grin.

Abram opened his briefcase, looking uncomfortable.

"Let's get to work," he said, sitting down on his stool. From his case, he extracted a notepad and pencil. He looked gravely up at Parry, who unflinchingly stared back while caressing the purring cat. "I've been to California and made a few personal inquiries among the students of your last class," Abram began. "I think, that if I dug a little deeper into the case, I might find proof of several extenuating circumstances, which didn't surface in the investigation five years ago."

Parry suddenly ceased stroking the cat.

"I've also begun to suspect," Abram continued, "that you weren't as confused by the time of the unfortunate incident... as you appeared to be." Parry did not grin anymore, but pressed his lips together -- hard.

"However, since I'm officially regarding you as insane now, re-examining the old court decision will not come up. There should be no risk of you landing in a prison, after such a long time here."

Parry was beginning to sweat, but grinned again: "You're damn smart, Doc. But like you said -- I'm insane now. So get started with the therapy! You've got a few minutes, before the canary starts to suffocate."

Saliva sprinkled on the glass as he spat out the words. Abram wiped a drop of sweat from his brow, cleared his throat, and begun to write: "Notes from conversations with Parry in the evening, September 14."

"First question. Make your answers as brief as you can..."

20

- Patrick, when was the first time you experienced the feeling that other people were out to get you?

- On the day I became six years old.

- Tell me about it.

- It was my birthday party. I got a lot of fine presents from all my relatives. Uncle Dan, who made much more money than my father, gave me a battery-powered fire-truck, with wire control and a pull-out ladder...

- Yes?

- I was overjoyed; this was before all toys became computerized. Uncle Dan looked at me in a strange way, and asked me if he and I could go out in the backyard to play with my new fire-truck.

Then suddenly my mom went afraid; she took me by the arm and said I'd just had a cold and shouldn't be going out. I knew she was lying, and it was a rather warm day by the end of April, but I didn't say anything that time.

When everybody had left and Mom was cleaning the house, I asked her why she had lied. She lifted me up into her lap and looked very sad. She told me that Uncle Dan had been very sick, and done terrible things. She was afraid that he was going to try doing something terrible again. She was very harsh when she warned me: "Patrick, always be careful with people you don't know. Sometimes you can't even trust those you think are your friends! Always remember that!"

That night, I sneaked out of the house and threw my uncle's present down a ravine. I cried myself to sleep over the fire-truck I didn't dare to keep; I had liked it, but now it was tainted with his evil intent. Mom didn't say anything when she discovered it was gone; Dad discovered it a bit later, but he said nothing either.

- Did you ever see your uncle again?

- No, never. A year or so later, I heard he'd died in some kind of unexplained accident.

- What did you feel when you heard of his death?

- I felt a great relief, as if some invisible threat had been moved away. That is, until I started to become aware of other things.

- Give me an example.

- Already at my first day in school, I saw how there were different factions of children forming on the schoolyard. They were somehow directed into separate clusters... as if there were invisible magnets under the ground, pulling them along. Girls over there, boys over here, white children here, Black children there, Catholic children here... they seemed to lack a will of their own, no minds of their own.

There were some oddballs and outcast children who were attracted to my company, but they all seemed totally different and alien to me. Sometimes a bully tried to pick on me, but the moment I started to fight I showed him a lesson. When I fought I was ruthless... I always carried a fistful of sand in my pocket, that I could throw in his eyes. I really tried to kill the opponent, make him blind; tear his nose off. I almost succeded in doing that once; it was the proudest moment of my early schooldays.

- How old were you then?

- Eight.

- I know you finished school early, with excellent grades in Language and Arts. What made you decide to become a teacher, and why teach Philosophy with a specialization in Logic?

- When I finished college by the end of the Seventies, I was extremely worried about the global condition. I lived in constant fear of global nuclear war breaking out any moment, and I had sleeping difficulties. Other students offered me dope, to help me sleep, but I never took any. Didn't trust them. I've never been a religious person, so I hoped philosophy could offer me a rational, logical way of understanding and dealing with the human condition.

- Try summing up your experience of the university years.

- Work, frustration, isolation. I managed the studies the way I managed school and college: say and do just as much as they expect of you -- no more, no less. When I graduated in the early Eighties, I began looking for teaching assignments all around California.

- What was your view of the world at that time?

- I can't see why we have to go through all this, there are old interviews where I say the same things.

- I still want to hear you say it. Please go on.

- I realized that invisible forces beyond my control were in motion, for purposes I could not understand. Behind the arms race of the superpowers, and the threat of a world war, were a few hidden groups who played a cynical game with world control at the stakes. I decided to get a regular job and live an ordinary life on the outside, while trying to gain insight into the conspiracies in my spare time.

- Did you come to any insights during your time as a teacher?

- I've mentioned them before: the hidden groups have certain limitations in their use of power. For example, they cannot read or control people's minds directly. Their main means of manipulating people's actions are indirect influence: the mass media, religion, political ideologies -- false constructs which appeal to our primitive, selfish instincts.

Bread and circuses, yeah. Already the Roman emperors knew that. Bread and circuses -- it's mostly so efficient, that the powerplay of the hidden groups is almost laid bare -- people see it without seeing it. I made this frightening discovery: that people often openly admitted that they felt manipulated, but didn't protest. There was some kind of programmed impulse to obey, which occurred after puberty -- a little earlier in women. I realized that there was yet another, hidden power behind those who fought for world dominion.

- Do you know anything about this "second power"?

- Not much. But I'm constantly trying to gather facts and fit them into some coherent pattern.

- You mentioned a programmed impulse to obedience...

- ...which occurred after puberty, yes. After a while, educating became my cover for subversive action; the young are in a period of flux when they are susceptible to non-conformist modes of thinking. I tried to sow the seeds of critical thought into my lectures, but I had to proceed with caution; there were informers among the students. Thanks to one of those, I lost my job at an L.A. university and had to take a job at a less esteemed university, which had recently been built in a Spanish-American district in San Diego.

- What exactly led to the unfortunate incident in San Diego?

- Hold it, Doc. Time to have a break for more air, or my canary will die.

- By all means... I'm suffocating myself.

21

Joyce and the warden stood waiting outside the special room when one of its doors opened. Abram came out into the basement, closing the door after him without locking it. He wiped the sweat off his forehead and took deep breaths of the warm, dry air.

"It's costing us extra to cool down this special room, when we are forced to heat up the rest of the building at this time of the year," Joyce said, looking up at the pipes in the ceiling.

"Believe me," Abram replied, "it'll be worth it."

"Did you make any progress?"

Joyce studied his eyes, which glittered in the gloom.

"Parry is the most fascinating patient I've ever met! The closer you think you're getting to his mind, the more cleverly he slips away."

"I've could've told you that," Joyce sighed. "Should we keep him here for the time being?"

"Sure, there's no danger. He's beginning to make himself comfortable, though he still thinks you're bugging the room by the air vent."

She made an indifferent face, and said: "As I understand it, you're going to give him free access to newspapers and new books, even television and radio. Are you fully aware of the consequences for his mental condition?"

Abram made a subtle imitation of one of her stances; he folded his arms and looked up into the ceiling.

"As I understand it," he said in a controlled voice, "you have systematically been subjecting an intelligent, sensitive human being to sensory deprivation for a dangerously long time. Are you aware of how that might have affected his mental condition?"

Joyce asked him with icy calm: "Are you trying to teach me how to run this institution?"

"No," he replied without moving, "I'm not after your job, nor your prestige. I want to try making Parry trust one single person in the world, before he completely forgets how that's done."

Her eyes opened wide at Abram, she shook her head in quiet resignation, and glanced at her wristwatch.

"God help you, Abram. You'd better go inside again, before he starts to worry."

22

Abram returned to the special room, locked the door, and shut the air vent. Parry was still standing with the kitten in his arms, impatiently staring with tired, squinting eyes.

"Right," Abram said, "we'll continue according to the plan."

He sat on the stool and put the notepad in his lap again.

"Okay," Parry said immediately, "this is the information I'll need to help you with the report. "I want weekly publications covering the whole world. They could be in Russian, Spanish, and Portugese too. Have no time for daily newspapers. Radio, of course, and TV -- to follow the official world view. Make that battery-powered ones -- Oregon would never allow me an electric cable."

Abram made quick notes, nodding.

"Good, good... any particular books? I can get hold of a lot of special literature at the CIA library in Langley, and also individual articles through the database."

"Get me something on the history of the CIA... but not the official crap! Pick the most critical writer you'll find, even if he's KGB. And also bring books on the history of world religions; astronomy; archaeology; geology with emphasis on oil and natural gas sites; plate tectonics; genetic engineering; computer development; Artificial Intelligence; biographies of famous tyrants from antiquity to the present..."

Parry stopped, stroked the purring cat, grinned and added in a lower voice: "And a short guide to the care of cats and birds."

Abram jotted down the last item, sat up and ran a hand over his moustaches. Parry demonstratively waved goodbye at him with his free arm.

"I get the message," Abram muttered. "I'll bring you the first part of my report to read, too." He took his briefcase, opened the air vent, nodded at Parry, and silently walked out of the echo-free room.

23

On the plane to Langley, Abram dictated a few notes into his pocket secretary.

"Item: Patrick strikes you as the archetypal paranoiac, as others have observed before me. The traumatic childhood... the precocious mind... the latent homophobia... violent tendencies... the idea of others being spies and marionettes... the obsession with conspiracies. And yet, there's a hint of self-consciousness in his madness, an irony that's mostly absent in these cases. Perhaps Parry sees the world as a theater watched by some malicious force, so that he's constantly being aware of an unseen audience..."

Abram frowned, then switched off the gadget. He took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes, then put the eyeglasses back on his head, pulled up the blanket over his chest and closed his eyes.

24

CIA HEADQUARTERS
LANGLEY, VIRGINIA
SEPTEMBER 15

The library was a clear-lit maze of bookshelves spread out across several wings, each wing visible from the window where Abram was sitting in front of a computer terminal. It was one of the many which were scattered throughout the library. Most of them were occupied by male and female employees searching for information.

An elderly librarian in baggy pants rolled a cart of books past Abram. They both nodded imperceptibly -- the librarian slipped him an envelope, Abram shoved it under his papers. Then they ignored each other. A heavily built, crew-cut man in his early sixties came walking along the bookshelves, halted near Abram, smiled with all of his tanned face, and came closer. He leaned over the terminal, folding his arms across his wide chest.

"Eh-bram! Good to se you, you been difficult t'find lately."

At the sound of the drawling, deep-nasal voice, Abram started and looked up from the monitor. He gave a quick smile of recognition, and turned in his chair.

"Hi Ned," he said, "sorry I couldn't come directly to your office when I arrived. I was so eager to search for material for my next report, that..."

Ned Wilson gave a laugh, patting him on the shoulder with a broad palm.

"Ha ha... always the dutiful one, that's fine. Could ah' just get a hint of what the next chapter'll be about?"

"Well... one could say that I will try to apply such a broad perspective as possible. The sequence might become a little unstructured, since I will let the imagination run a little over the limit for traditional future reports..."

"Ehxcellent, ehxcellent!"

Ned's phone suddenly beeped inside his jacket. He held it to his ear, pressed the receiving button, and listened attentively for a couple of seconds.

He put a hand over the receiver and grinned excusingly: "So much to do, so little time... be seeing ya!"

Ned hastily walked away, leaving Abram to concentrate on the computer terminal again. Abram opened the unsealed envelope which the librarian had given him: inside was the sealed letter addressed to "Dr. Patrick Rymowicz" from Bettina Avarez, and a separate note. The note was a computer printout with a handwritten message added on top:

Abram,

here is the X-ray of the envelope you gave me. The letter inside was wrapped in black paper, and a rather goofy one -- we had quite a laugh over at our department.

Good luck with that patient of yours -- he must have a way with women, though he might not know it. ;-) Greg

NMR SCAN PROGRAM
ENVELOPE READING (CERTAINTY 94%):
Dear Dr. Rymowicz,
I still long to hear from you. I pray each night that you are well.
Please, please, let me know that you have noticed my love for you!
My passion for you burns hotter with the years. If you suffer greatly in your desolation, perhaps I can bring you comfort.
I would do anything to help you to freedom. If you need money, anything -- just write to me. I will wait for your word and obey it.
Forever yours,
Bettina

Bettina had ended the letter with her address and phone number. Abram choked a chortle, then turned grave and slipped the sealed letter into his briefcase.

25

WESTMOREHAM INSTITUTE
SEPTEMBER 16

"It's boring," Parry said. He pointed at the thick report Abram was holding up to the glass wall, so that Parry could read it. "Flip back to the front page again, and I'll show you what's wrong with it."

Abram did so, and held up the title page so that both of them could view the text:

IMAGES OF THE NEW FUTURE
By DR. ABRAM LEMERCIER
CONTAINS CLASSIFIED MATERIAL -- UNAUTHORIZED COPYING STRICTLY FORBIDDEN

PART 1: THE COLLAPSE OF THE OLD WORLD ORDER
1.1. The World According to Jalta
1.2. The Time Of Consolidation: 1945-1985
1.3. Gorbachev And After: 1985-1991
1.4. The End of History?
1.5. Notes

"You see?" Parry said. "Old stuff, even for a guy who's been locked away for as long as me. That phrase 'The End of History' is completely outdated. If the rest is going to be worth reading, it has to be one hell of a report."

Abram grunted.

"Well, that's why I contacted you. There aren't many paranoiacs with your IQ level -- and I've seen a few. Besides, this is just an introduction."

Parry backed and turned around on the spot, scratching himself restlessly.

"I can't get started before I get the things on my list. Where are they?"

Abram carefully put his report back into his briefcase, and smiled.

"They came with me today. I'll be away for a few days, and let you go through it, get your mind working again. As soon as I leave this room, the wardens will start carrying in your new stuff."

Parry looked as if he was going to say something, but held back. Abram frowned, flashing a little smile.

"You don't have to say 'thank you', Patrick. After all, it's me who's about to exploit your talents."

Parry showed his teeth, unsmiling: "I haven't forgotten that you're a shrink too, Lemercier. And shrinks just love feeling superior. That's why I hate'em, the smug faggots."

Abram, still frowning, cocked his head and gave Parry a questioning look: "I'm a psychologist, not a psychiatrist. And suppose," he said calmly, "that I was a 'faggot'. Would that bother you?"

Parry looked away, going tense, opening and closing his fists -- then suddenly spun around, and banged his fists on the glass wall with a manic grimace. When he saw Abram flinch away, he gave a smattering laugh.

"No, it won't bother me," he said scornfully, "as long as there's this wall between us! It protects me as well as you, Doc!"

Abram left the special room with no further words. The wardens started carrying in the books, magazines, and other things into Parry's room-half.

26

WESTMOREHAM INSTITUTE
SEPTEMBER 21

"Are you ready to begin, Doc?"

Parry was sitting cross-legged on his mattress on the other side of the glass wall, surrounded by books, magazines, and notebooks strewn across the floor. The gray kitten rose from its litterbox and started walking around the small space, peering up at the canary who was chirping in its cage. A combined TV set and radio stood in a corner, showing a Ren & Stimpy cartoon. Parry smiled with his mouth tightly closed; his expectant face had gained a fleshier hue, and his body was less thin -- more on the lean side.

Abram, still clothed in a damp overcoat, sat on the stool by the glass wall with his notepad and pen ready. He looked sternly into Parry's reddish eyes.

"Now remember, Parry, that I value your imagination, your own way of looking at the world. Let your mind wander freely, don't censor yourself. You've got nothing to lose."

Parry grinned back, squinting in an ironic grimace: "I've got nothing to lose, true." His voice was no longer hoarse, but sharp and grating. "But you've got everything to lose, Doc: your fine job; your professional reputation as a psychologist; your pension; all the privileges a CIA employee can get hold of. I won't need to censor my theories -- your own impulse to obedience will do that for me!"

For a second Abram seemed to be near an outburst of anger -- but he calmed himself.

Parry breathed in, then out, and began: "First, let's talk about theories of world blocs..."

27

CIA HEADQUARTERS
OCTOBER 6

Ned Wilson came walking toward Abram in the headquarters' main lobby, clutching a thick binder.

He walked with long strides, slightly stooping; his tanned, square face was tense. Abram halted, blinking repeatedly and nervously at the approaching figure. A few feet away from Abram, Ned saw him, smiled wide with all his teeth and waved with the binder.

"Eh-bram!" he shouted enthusiastically. "I was just on my way to your car!"

Abram, dressed in a dark-blue pinstripe suit and tie, smiled weakly and stretched out his free hand.

Ned shook it heartily, patting him on the shoulder: "Congratulations, old boy! The Security Council was delighted over the second part'o your report. Some of us were... well, quite surprah-sed over your creative spark. Where d'you get all your wild ideas?"

Abram made an embarrassed grin, tugging at his beard. "Er, well... it's not easily explained."

"You tired after the airtrip? No? Fine! Let's go out in the sun'n talk, it's a fantastic day for being October."

Ned more or less pushed Abram before him with his palm. They traversed the arched glass entrance where a thin stream of employees walked by, and out onto the paved path at the front of the entrance hall. It was a lukewarm autumn day, and the surrounding trees shone yellow and green in the low sun. After walking about a hundred feet the path split three ways. Ned took off to the left, walking down a low set of stairs; Abram followed by his side, both silent. Halfway down a sloping path Ned stopped and looked around; then he opened the binder, holding the spread between them.

It was the front page of the second part of Abram's report:

IMAGES OF THE NEW FUTURE
By DR. ABRAM LEMERCIER
CONTAINS CLASSIFIED MATERIAL -- UNAUTHORIZED COPYING STRICTLY FORBIDDEN

PART 2: A NEW OLD WORLD ORDER?

2.1. Models For a New World Order
2.1.1. Religious blocs
2.1.2. Energy resource blocs
2.1.3. Agriculture blocs
2.1.4. Military power blocs
2.1.5. Geographical blocs
2.1.6. The new instability of bloc structures

2.2. The Near Global Future
2.2.1. Local conflict fires
2.2.2. Ethnic nationalism
2.2.3. Actors in the Global Economy
2.2.4. The increased oil consumption
2.2.5. Suggestion for a Mecca Doctrine
2.2.6. The Balkan problem

2.3. Unexpected Global Threats 2.3.1. Climate changes and large migrations
2.3.2. The Greenhouse Effect
2.3.3. The ozone layer
2.3.4. Suggestion for a Global Environment Court
2.3.5. The next Ice Age?
2.3.6. Comets and meteorites
2.3.7. Suggestion for a Planetary Defense
2.3.8. New religious movements
2.3.9. Evolution is still in motion
2.3.10. The rise of Artificial Intelligence
2.3.11. The effects of Genetic Engineering on mankind

2.4. Notes and Sources

Ned put his finger on the sub-heading "2.2.6.: The Balkan problem".

"The President has read a copy, and he's recently expressed a positive interest in your suggestion; an agreement with Russia about splittin' up the Balkans into guarded security zones." He chuckled, adding: "Hell, it'd be jus' like ol' Germany! I'm gettin' nostalgic all over..."

"Well, not quite that way," Abram objected carefully. "Now that we share the ideals of democratic capitalism with the East, only the purely military and ethnic tensions will remain."

Ned nodded compliantly, frowning: "True, true, ah' was jus' kidding. By the way," he added as if casually, "where'd you get the idea of a 'Mecca Doctrine'?"

Abram seemed confused, looked up chapter "2.2.5. Suggestion for a Mecca Doctrine", and brightened up: "Oh, that!" He ran a hand over his beard as he scanned the pages.

"I simply realized," he continued, "that we here in the secular West are so used to thinking in terms of economy and strategy, that we forget how much religion controls thought in the Orient and India.

"So in order to secure the oil fields there, we should seek guarantees that the nuclear powers in the region -- especially Israel -- would choose another firsthand target. Of course such an agreement must be strictly confidential..."

"Of course," Ned agreed, "but that's what the text said. Ah'm asking, y'see..." He shoved his hands in the pockets of his beige suit, and leaned closer. "...because the National Security Agency is looking for talented people for the Middle East Branch. There are Embassy seats available in Cairo, Ankara, and Tel Aviv... top salaries and much coveted. I'd very much like to suggest you at the next staff meeting."

He looked expectantly at his employee. Abram's face showed a mix of surprise and pride -- he dropped the binder on the paving, quickly bent down and picked it up, embarrassed.

"I'm flattered of course," he said awkwardly as he stood up, "but I've always put my academic career at the top of my list before, so... I'll consider the offer, Ned."

He handed Ned the binder.

"I told you the Company always stands by its employees, Eh-bram!" Ned thumped him in the back, and Abram looked embarrassed again. "Now let me buy you a beer to celebrate this."

28

WESTMOREHAM INSTITUTE
OCTOBER 7

"You're disappointing me, Doc!"

There was a flatness about Parry's voice in the echo-free special room, but it was still loud and piercing. Abram almost looked hurt, as he stood by the other side and held Part 2 of his report for Parry to read.

"Now be reasonable, Parry. I only used those parts of your suggestions that really were of importance. If you, on the other hand, feel that I'm trying to take the credit for your ideas, I can understand..."

"To hell with the credit!" Parry shouted, spraying spittle on the greasy plexiglass. "That you would take the credit for my work was part of our deal," he continued in a lower tone, pressing his palms to the barrier. "Can't you see? Your boss was only pretending to praise the idea of splitting the Balkans into East and West zones. That was a stupid idea in typical Cold War style, which I added to test your attention.

"So if you're not lying about what your boss said, then he's trying to hide... his real interest in the Mecca Doctrine. Aren't you wondering why he's doing that?"

Joyce the cat cowered by the locked door, meowing anxiously. Parry turned around, and went and picked it up. Abram lowered his arms and walked over to the air vent to open it.

29

When Abram had returned and re-sealed the air intake, he abruptly raised his hand in a stop signal.

"Wait -- don't say anything. I've been thinking about what you said of Ne... my superior, and I think there is a logical explanation. If he thought the Mecca Doctrine was an important suggestion, he would of course not want to have it revealed at once, to avoid the spreading of rumors..."

Irritated, Parry broke him off: "Ergo: he won't trust you. He might even believe that you've got secret information from a leak in the CIA or the Pentagon. You know a few people there, don't you? Intelligence people are a paranoid bunch... they need to talk to a trusted shrink sometimes. Someone like you."

Abram gave him a baffled stare.

"Let us for a moment forget where we are right now," Abram said with great self-control, "and ask ourselves how likely it would be... that you, by the aid of a handful of books, would have stumbled upon a well-guarded military secret."

Parry made a superior grin, caressing Joyce's head.

"Simple, Doc. I just have to look for a field which is strangely empty of writing and speculation, a logical empty space where people like you seem to be afraid of going. For instance, it recently struck me that logically speaking, the CIA shouldn't exist..."

Abram touched his forehead as if he suddenly had a migraine, shielding his eyes.

"What," he half-whispered, "are you saying?"

Parry lowered his voice more, leaning forward secretively: "The CIA is the only so-called spy network and 'intelligence' agency I know, that once published comic-books to advertise itself -- after World War Two, you know.

"It was the first intelligence agency that made its secret files public when the politicians ordered so, long before the STASI was forced to do the same. The only secret organization that openly leaked about assassination attempts on political enemies like Castro, and even bragged about it. An organization that seemed to be powerless, while one particular President formed his own private intelligence agency.

"Even when George Bush, a former head of CIA, was President, nothing was made to clean up 'The Company's' messy and pointless Latin American operations -- operations which only helped one druglord or another, like Noriega for instance. The so-called 'War On Drugs' was a joke."

Abram was looking before himself with unseeing eyes, slowly shaking his head like a sleepwalker. It appeared he tried to say something, and his mouth moved.

"And you who are supposed to so be smart, Doc!" Parry's nose touched the plexiglass. "Have you never even wondered why such a malfunctioning organization as the CIA even exists? Who benefits from its existence? The Pentagon, with its own intelligence branches that always have looked upon the CIA as a rival? The Russians? The President?

"Why did it take several years after the war, before an eccentric officer by the name 'Wild Bill' Donovan was assigned to revive a stone-dead wartime organization called the OSS? Why has the CIA never accomplished anything useful, except showing photos of Cuban missile bases -- taken with the military's hardware? Think, Doc!"

Abram answered tonelessly as if to himself: "I can't answer those questions... I'm just a consultant hired to write futurology studies, an academic... I don't know the head of the CIA, or any Joint Chiefs of Staff, haven't even seen the President. To question the existence of the CIA like that, is... is --"

"Madness?" Parry was slightly amused. He bent his knees and let the cat down on the floor. "Wasn't it the imagination of a madman you needed? Or are you getting scared now, when the monkey in the cage is laughing back at you?"

He began to laugh, loudly and sharply. He rested his palms on his knees, bending over so that his ruddy head bumped lightly against the glass wall; then again and again, while he rocked with laughter. His eyes watered, and he closed his eyes with his face distorted by something not quite like joy.

Abram stood looking at the laughing, doubled-up figure for half a minute... then he grabbed his briefcase and rushed out of the room without opening the air vent.

30

Joyce seemed genuinely worried when Abram surprised her by rushing out, pale in face, chased by Parry's laughter. She snapped her fingers at the warden Simon, who marched inside.

"What happened?" she asked Abram, who leaned his back to the wall.

He eased his tie and held a hand to his chest, took a few deep breaths and seemed to calm down: "No problem, no problem at all. We were discussing and got a little agitated... that's all. I've been through worse," he assured, straightening himself.

"I warned you," Joyce stated without emotion. "Parry is smart enough to drive people crazy, once he's made them listen to him."

"I know," Abram muttered with slight irritation.

"By the way, he's already read the books he got, and he's still nagging about getting a Kevlar vest, a gas mask, and a lie detector... ironically, he doesn't seem too interested in the Internet."

"He missed out on it because he's been here. Tell him to be patient. I'll send some more books."

"More errands?" Joyce raised a sarcastic eyebrow.

"I'll have to discuss Parry's case with some old colleagues."

He hastened up the stairs to the first floor; Joyce remained standing with her hands in her coat pockets, looking up after him.

"I'm looking forward to reading about Parry when you're finished..!"

But her call trailed away; he was already out of hearing range.