'My guess is, he had begun to have doubts, perhaps he even tried to back out, or go to the FBI or something.
Possibly there's some record of his doubts in his missing sketches. But it appears I won't never see them. He was killed, probably with a judo chop to the back of the neck.
That was their specialty in those days. In fact, everybody who saw this agent was killed, at some effort, including another peace demonstrator named Peter Fan is, a Marine named Donny Fenn, and later attempts were made on my wife, who had seen the agent with Trig. She was married to Donny Fenn at the time. I believe Ralph Goldstein was killed in the same way. Their bodies were put in the building and it was detonated. It goes down into the books as a violent fool and a math geek. But the books are always wrong. It was something entirely kids used by older, smarter, far more ruthless men, then thrown away for a momentary strategic advantage. It was a war, but the cold one, not the hot one.'
'The one we won.'
'I suppose we did.'
'What happened to the Russian?'
'Well, our intelligence people found out a way to turn the information against him. I don't know much about it, but he's dead. They had it on CNN. You could see the burned bodies in the back of the Jeep.'
'That nasty boy?'
'That one.'
'And the man who was trying to kill you?'
'Well, he wasn't trying to kill me. He was trying to kill my wife. He was stopped,' Bob said.
'And he ain't never coming back.'
'Were you responsible?'
Bob just nodded.
'Do you know what you are? Sergeant, you're a sacred killer. All societies need them. All civilizations need them.
It is to the eternal shame and the current damnation of this country that it refuses anymore to acknowledge them and thinks it can get by without respecting them. So let an old bat speak a truth: you are the necessary man. Without you it all goes away.'
Bob said nothing. Speculation on his place in the nature of things was not his style.
The old lady sensed this, and asked for an accounting of the politics of the affair, the details of history. He gave it, succinctly enough.
'Odd, isn't it? As you've explained it, after it's all counted up and all the accounts are settled, the one party to it all that could be said to benefit is the old Russian communist apparatus. It's kept them from going under another few years. And who can tell what that'll mean?
The cruel irony of history, I suppose.'
'I wouldn't know about that, ma'am. They were very happy, the intelligence people, that they were able to stop this fellow Pashin. He was their real target. My wife was his, but he was ours, and we got him first.'
'Well, anyway: you've provided a measure of serenity to my life. My son wasn't a fool, he was overmatched by professionals, who've been punished. Justice isn't much, but it helps the nights go easier.'
'Yes, ma'am. I agree.'
'Sometimes you don't even get that, so one must be very grateful for what one does get.'
'Yes, ma'am.'
'Now ... I know you weren't working for me, you were never my employee. But the one power I still have in the world is to satisfy myself through my checkbook. I would very much enjoy getting it out now and writing a nice big, fat one.'
'Thank you,' he said.
'That's not necessary.'
'Are you sure?'
'I am.'
'Soon there'll be college expenses.'
'Not for a while. We're doing fine.'
'Oh, I hope I haven't spoiled things by bringing up money.'
'No, ma'am.'
'Well, then--' 'There is one thing, though.'
'Name it.'
'The painting.'
'The painting?'
'The eagle after the fight. I don't know a thing about art and I don't know a thing about birds, but I'd be honored to have that. It has some meaning to me.'
'You felt your breast stir when you saw it?'
