“But you aren’t the type,” Salsbury said desperately. He had been shiny with sweat; now he was dripping with it. “You just aren’t the type!”
“What type is that?”
“Queer!” he blurted. “You aren’t a damned queer!”
Still bluffing but with more good cards on the table to back his hand, Paul said, “We don’t all look like what we are, you know. Most of us don’t advertise it.”
“You were married.”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“You had children!”
Paul shrugged.
“You’re sniffing around that Edison bitch!”
“Have you ever heard of AC-DC?” Paul asked. He grinned.
Salsbury closed his eyes.
“Ogden?”
He said nothing.
“Get up, Ogden.”
“Don’t touch me.”
“Lean against the desk.”
“I won’t get up. ”
“Come on. You’ll love it.”
“No. I won’t.”
“You loved it from Parker.”
“That’s not true!”
“You’re not the type.”
“I’m not.”
“Admit it.”
He didn’t move.
“A talent for Greek. ”
Salsbury winced. “No.”
“Lean on the desk.”
“It hurts…”
“Of course. Now get up and lean on the desk and drop your pants. Come on.”
Salsbury shuddered. His face was drawn and ashen.
“If you don’t get up, Ogden, I’ll have to throw you out of that chair. You can’t refuse me. You can’t get away from me. You can’t fight me off, not when I’ve got the gun, not when your arm’s all torn up like that.”
“Oh, Jesus God,” Salsbury said miserably.
“You’ll love it. You’ll love the pain. Parker told me how much you love the pain. ”
Salsbury began to cry. He didn’t weep gently or quietly, but let go with great, wracking sobs. Tears seemed to spurt from his eyes. He shook and gagged.
“Are you scared, Ogden?”
“S-Scared. Yes.”
“You can save yourself.”
“From… from…”
“From being raped.”
“H-How?”
“Answer my questions.”
“Don’t want to.”
“Get up then.”
“Please…”
Ashamed of himself, sick of this violent game but determined to carry on with it, Paul took hold of the front of Salsbury’s shirt. He shook him and tried to lift him out of the chair. “When I’m done with you, I’ll let Bob Thorp have you. I’ll tape your mouth so you can’t talk to him, and I’ll program him to put it to you.” He was incapable of doing that, of course. But Salsbury obviously believed he would. “And not just Thorp. Others. Half a dozen others.”
With that, Salsbury’s resistance dissolved. “Anything. I’ll tell you anything,” he said, his voice distorted by the wretched sobbing that he couldn’t control. “Anything you want. Just don’t touch me. Oh, Jesus. Oh, don’t touch me. Don’t make me undress. Don’t touch. Don’t.”
Still twisting Salsbury’s shirt in his left hand, leaning toward the man, nearly shouting in his face, Paul said, “Who were those men in the helicopter? Unless you want to be used until you’re raw, you better tell me who they were.”
“Dawson and Klinger.”
“There were three.”
“I don’t know the pilot’s name.”
“Dawson and Klinger. First names?”
“Leonard Dawson and—”
“The Leonard Dawson?”
“Yes. And Ernst Klinger.”
“Is Klinger a government man?”
“He’s an army general.”
“Is this a military project?”
“No.”
“A government project?”
“No,” Salsbury said.
Paul knew all of the questions. There was no point in the rapid-fire interrogation at which he had to hesitate.
And there was never a single moment when Salsbury dared hesitate.
Ernst Klinger crouched behind a yard-high wall of shrubbery across the alleyway from the municipal parking lot. Stunned, confused, he watched them load the woman into the white Cadillac van with the words BLACK RIVER — EMERGENCY painted in red letters on the side.
At 11:02 the ambulance pulled out of the parking lot, swung into the alley and from there onto North Union Road. It turned right, toward the square.
Its bright red flashers washed the trees and the buildings, and sent crimson snakes of light wriggling along the wet pavement.
The bearded, white-haired man who stood in the parking lot was Sam Edison. Klinger recognized him from a photograph that he had seen in one of the rooms above the general store, little more than an hour ago.
Edison watched the ambulance until it turned east at the square. He was too far away for Klinger to get a shot at him with the Webley. When the ambulance was out of sight, he went inside the municipal building.
Have we lost control of the town? Klinger asked himself. Is it all coming down on our heads: the field test, the plan, the project, the future? Sure as hell looks that way. Sure does. So… Is it time to get out of Black River, out of the country with a big bundle of cash and the phony identity Leonard provided?
Don’t panic, another part of him thought. Don’t be rash. Wait. See what happens. Give it a few minutes.
He looked at his watch. 11:03.
Thunder rumbled in the mountains.
It was going to rain again.
11:04.
He had been hunkered down for so long that his legs ached. He longed to stand up and stretch.
What are you waiting here for? he asked himself. You can’t plan your strategy without information. You’ve got to reconnoiter. They’re probably in Thorp’s office. Get under those windows. Maybe you can hear what they’re
