“FAP the enemy,” I said. “Finessed back onto itself. I will get it to do all the work; I already have.”
“How many other people do you think know? About President Fremont, I mean?”
“Look at his foreign policy. Trade deals with Russia, grain sales at a loss to us; he gives them what they want. The U.S. is their supplier; it does what they say. If they’re out of grain they get grain; if they’re low on—”
“But our big military establishment.”
“To keep our own people down. Not theirs.”
Rachel said, “You didn’t know this yesterday.”
“I knew it when I saw the shoe ad,” I said. “When I saw the message from the Communist Party that was also from FAP. They are working with the KGB in New York, not against it; how could it operate openly if FAP didn’t let it? There is one intelligence community and one only. And we are all its victims, wherever we live.”
“I need a drink,” Rachel managed to say.
“Take heart,” I said. “The beginning of the change has set in. The turning point has come. They will be exposed; they will stand in court, every one of them, and answer for the crimes they have committed.”
“Because of you?” She gazed timidly at me.
“Because of Valis,” I said.
Rachel said, “It’s not you any longer, Nick. You’re not the same person.”
“That is right,” I said.
“Who are you?”
I said, “Their adversary. Who is going to see them hunted down.”
“You can’t do it by—”
“I’ll be given the names of others.”
“Like yourself?”
I nodded.
“So that letter,” Rachel said, “that shoe ad—it would never have gotten in the mail without the permission and cooperation of the American authorities.”
“That’s right,” I said.
“What about Aramchek?”
I said nothing.
“Is Valis Aramchek?” Rachel asked hesitantly. “Or maybe you shouldn’t tell me; maybe I’m not supposed to know.”
“I’ll tell you—” I began, but all I once I felt two great invisible hands grip me by the upper arms; they held so tightly that I grunted in pain. Rachel stared at me. I could not speak any further; all I could do was try to withstand the pressure of the invisible hands holding me. Then, at last, they released me. I was free.
“What happened?” Rachel asked.
“Nothing.” I took in deep, unsteady breaths.
“The look on your face—something had hold of you, didn’t it? You started to say something you shouldn’t have.” She patted me gently on the arm. “It’s okay, Nick; you don’t have to say. I don’t want you to say.”
“Maybe some other time,” I said.
16
Toward the end of the day two FAPers, both of them lean and alert young men, showed up at my door.
Silently, they examined the shoe ad I had received in the mail. I showed them the piece of paper on which I had written the encoded message that I had extracted.
“I am Agent Townsend,” the first FAPer said. “And this is my teammate, Agent Snow. It was very alert of you to report this, Mr. Brady.”
I said, truthfully, “I knew it would be coming. I even knew the day.”
“I imagine,” Agent Townsend said, “that the Communists would very much like to control someone in your position. You have power over a large number of recording artists, do you not?”
“Yes,” I said.
“You can sign up and record whomever you wish?”
“I need the approval of two other executives,” I said. “But usually they go along with me.”
“They have come to respect your judgment?”
“Yes,” I said.
“How has the Party contacted you before?” Agent Snow asked.
“They never before—”
“We realize they never turned the screws before. But did they contact you through mutual friends, or by phone, or mail? Or directly, through their agents?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I know the contact, the pressure has been there, but it’s been too devious and subtle up until now to put my finger on.”
“No one person in particular.”
“No,” I said.
Agent Townsend said, “This is the first time they’ve come out overtly, then.”
“Yes,” I said.
“In your case,” Agent Townsend said, “they made a mistake. We have a mail intercept on you, Mr. Brady; we intercepted this document and decoded it ourselves. We knew the hour of its arrival in your mailbox. You were watched as you took it upstairs to this apartment. You were timed as to how long it took you to react to it. And of course we were looking to see your reaction. Frankly, we didn’t expect you to call us. We assumed you’d destroy it.”
“My wife suggested I destroy it,” I said. “But that could have been taken two ways.”
“Oh, yes,” Agent Townsend said. “Two ways easily. You read the encoded message and then burned it; that’s a normal process for Party members; they wouldn’t leave something like this lying around after they had assimilated its contents; it’d be incriminating.”
The sibyl had directed me right. Inwardly, without any visible sign, I sighed with relief. Thank God for her, I said to myself; on my own, like Rachel, I most likely would have destroyed it, imagining that was enough. And thus incriminated myself forever.
Destroying it would have proved I had read it. That I knew what it was. One does not carry a harmless shoe ad to the bathroom and set fire to it in the bathtub.
Studying the name and address written on the back of the document, Agent Townsend said to Agent Snow, “This looks like . . . you know, that girl’s handwriting.” To me he said, “Your friend Phil Dick knows a girl named Vivian Kaplan. Do you know her?”
“No,” I said, “but he’s mentioned her.”
“You wouldn’t have any samples of her handwriting around?” Agent Townsend asked.
“No,” I said.
“Vivian is a rather far-out person,” Agent Townsend said with a half smile. “She reported about you recently, Mr. Brady, that you hold prolonged conversations with God. Is that true?”
“No,” I said.
“She got it from his friend,” Agent Snow pointed out to Agent Townsend.
“What,” Agent Townsend continued, “would possibly give rise to such an idea in her head? Can you think of anything?”
I said, “I never met the girl.”
“She
