your Middle East interests.'
'My what?' shouted the widow, her face contorted, her mouth gaping.
'That Off Shore company—’
'Offshore Investments,' completed Ardis, again stunned. 'It was eight months of my life but that's all it was!'
'And how you have contacts throughout the whole area—’
'I have no contacts!' screamed Mrs. Vanvlanderen. 'I left over ten years ago and never went back! The only Arabs I know are a few high rollers I met in London and Divonne.'
'Rollers in bed or at the tables?'
'Both, if you want to know, lover boy!… Why would they think that?'
'Because you gave them a damn good reason to start looking when you had that son of a bitch cremated this morning!'
'Andy?'
'Was there someone else hanging around here who happened to drop dead? Or perhaps was poisoned? In a cover-up!'
'What the hell are you talking about?'
'Your fourth or fifth husband's body, that's what I'm talking about. No sooner does it reach the damned mortuary than you're on the phone ordering his immediate cremation. You think that's not going to start people wondering—people who are paid to wonder about things like that? No autopsy, ashes somewhere over the Pacific.'
'I never made such a call!' roared Ardis, leaping up from the couch. 'I never gave such an order!'
'You did!' yelled Sundstrom. 'You said you and Andrew had a pact.'
'I didn't say it and we didn't have one!'
'Varak doesn't bring us wrong information,' stated the high-tech scientist firmly.
'Then someone lied to him.' The widow suddenly lowered her voice. 'Or he was lying.'
'Why would he? He's never lied before.'
'I don't know,' said Ardis, sitting down and stabbing out her cigarette. 'Eric,' she continued, looking up at Inver Brass's traitor. 'Why did you come all the way out here to tell me this? Why didn't you just call? You have our private numbers.'
'Varak again. Nobody really knows how he can do what he does, still he does it. He's in Chicago, but he's made arrangements to be given the telephone number of every incoming call to Bollinger's office and residence, as well as the office and residence of each member of his staff. Under those conditions I don't make phone calls.'
'In your case it might be hard to explain to that council of senile lunatics you belong to. And the only calls I've had were from the office and friends with condolences. Also the Rashad woman; none of those would interest Mr. Varak or your benevolent society of rich misfits.'
'The Rashad woman. You say she didn't mention the attacks on Kendrick's houses. Assuming Varak's wrong and the investigating units haven't put certain facts together and come up with you and perhaps a few others out here, why didn't she? She had to know about them.'
Ardis Vanvlanderen reached for a cigarette, her eyes now betraying an unfamiliar helplessness. 'There could be several reasons,' she said without much conviction as she snapped up the flame of the lighter. 'To begin with, the Vice President is frequently overlooked where clearances are concerned regarding security blackouts—Truman had never heard of the Manhattan Project. Then there's the matter of avoiding panic, if these attacks took place—and I'm not ready to concede that they did. Your Varak's been caught in one lie; he's capable of another. In addition, if the full extent of the damage in Virginia and Colorado was known, we might lose staff control. No one likes to think he might be killed by suicidal terrorists… Finally, I go back to the attacks themselves. I don't believe they ever happened.'
Sundstrom stood motionless, gripping the glass in both hands, as he stared down at his former lover. 'He did it, didn't he, Ardis?' he said softly. 'That financial megalomaniac couldn't stand the possibility that a small group of “benevolent misfits” might replace his man with another who could cut off his pipeline to
