“…until further evidence is accumulated. End of report.” It was McMurtrie’s rumbling voice. I looked at Solomon; he sipped his bourbon and kept scanning the area.
“Progress report number six. Subject: investigation of possible Presidential assassination plot. Trip to North Lake Research Laboratories. Visited Dr. Alfonso Pena, head of lab. Also spoke with Dr. Peter Thornton and Dr. Morris Malachi. Was accompanied by Dr. Adrian Klienerman.
“Pena reports both Presidential doubles died of cause unknown. No violence. No poison. Klienerman checked Pena’s test data but was not allowed to check the actual corpses. Nasty argument between Pena and Klienerman. Pena passed out. Thornton claimed it was heart trouble. He suggested that we get permission to let Klienerman do his own tests from General Halliday, who is the majority owner of North Lake Labs. Have booked flight to Aspen for Klienerman and myself to see the General.”
My eyes focused on Solomon, the bar, the shadowy flickering underwater lighting beyond. But before I could say anything, McMurtrie’s voice came on again.
“Additional note. Klienerman says duplicates could not possibly be so exactly similar to the President without, quote, biogenetic mapping, unquote. Then he said something about a band of brothers, or brotherhood. He was dozing as he said this and is sleeping now, as we fly to Aspen. More later. Action item: get full background on Pena and North Lake Labs.”
The spool stopped with a sharp click. I pulled the plug out of my ear and let the wire whiz back into the tape player in my shirt pocket. Solomon had almost finished his drink. “That spool was mailed to the office from the Aspen airport, when Mac first landed there, on his way to see the General. He addressed it to himself. Standard operatin’ procedure.”
I grabbed at my drink, suddenly wishing it were real rum. It took only one swallow to finish it.
“So what’s your problem?” I asked as I put the glass back on the bar.
Solomon nodded to the bartender and kept silent until the refills were in front of us. “My problem’s kinda simple. And kinda complicated. Nobody in the office is followin’ up on Mac’s reports.”
“What?”
“I got th’ tapes and papers and his… well, what they call his ‘effects.’ I got assigned to sortin’ ’em out and sendin’ his personal stuff back to his wife… er, widow.”
“I never knew McMurtrie was married.”
“Got two boys. One in college, th’ other in the Aerospace Force. His wife lives in California.”
“Hell,” I said.
“Anyways, these progress reports on Mac’s incomplete investigation sounded damned important to me. I took ’em to our section chief. He comes back a day later and says t’ forgit ’em. Bein’ handled higher up.”
“By whom?”
“By nobody, it turns out. Took me a coupla days of sniffin’ around to find out. All Mac’s reports were just tucked away in a file, locked up tight. And everybody in th’ office is stonewallin’ it. Mac’s dead an’ nobody’s movin’ an inch toward finishin’ the investigation he’s been workin’ on.”
“They wouldn’t do that without orders from higher up,” I said.
“Yeah. I figured. But when this here tape arrived in th’ mail yesterday, I got aholt of it before anybody else. Just luck. I was in the office early, when the first mail delivery come in.”
“And the good old fucking mail service took a damned week to deliver his tape,” I said.
Solomon broke into a lopsided grin. “Yeah.”
“So you kept the tape?”
“Hell, no! Everything’s logged in and double-checked in the office. I jest borrowed it for a few minutes and made my own copy of it… before anybody else got into the office. I let the section chief have the tape soon’s he showed up… right ’bout time for the mornin’ coffee break.”
“And what was his reaction?” I asked.
“Combination scared and sore. I made sure he played the original tape while I was in the office. I volunteered t’ take on Mac’s action items an’ check out that doctor and his lab. Chief said no. Buck it upstairs.”
“And you think it’s being buried.”
His smile disappeared. “I know it’s buried. This investigation’s as dead as Mac, far’s the office’s concerned. That’s why I looked you up. Mac tole me once you could be trusted.”
“I’m just a glorified public relations man…”
“Yew work right for th’ President,” Solomon said. “I don’t know anybody in th’ Government’s any higher… that I can trust.”
I caught myself in the middle of taking a very deep breath, the kind that steadies your pulse rate. Or so they say.
“Okay,” I said. “I don’t know what the hell I’m going to do about this, but I’ll do something. It sure looks as if Klienerman was killed because he was catching onto something important.”
“And Mac along with him.”
“Right.” I could feel my jaw clenching. “I don’t suppose anybody’s actually checked out this man Pena and the North Lake Labs.”
“Nope. But I can get that done.”
“Really? When I tried it—”
“Mac had a loua friends. In the Pentagon, too. We can find out what we have to know. Might take a few days, is all.”
“Good. Now, should I keep this tape or should you?”
“Me,” he said, holding out his hand. “They already know I’m sniffin’ around on this. Less they know about yew bein’ involved, better off we both’ll be.”
I handed the palm-sized black box back to him. “Hank… do you have any idea of who
He shook his head. “Wish I did.”
“It’s like staggering around in the dark, isn’t it?”
“Yep. One thing, though…”
“What’s that?”
“The President’s ol’ man is involved, some way.”
It was a while before I could answer. “Yeah… I think you’re right.”
“Helluva world, ain’t it?” he said, and grabbed his bourbon.
ELEVEN
Most people think that the National Archives is the nation’s treasure house of information, the memory storage bin of the country, the place where all the facts are kept neatly filed away behind a facade that proclaims, “What is past is prologue.”
But we were meeting at the Library of Congress—Vickie, Hank Solomon, and I—sneaking into that vast marble-walled building from three different entrances, at three different times, in a feeble effort to prevent anyone from figuring out that we were getting together there. It was Vickie’s idea to pick the Library of Congress, and Hank’s to stagger our arrival times. I did what I was told.
Hank’s friends had been able to piece together a lot more information about Dr. Pena and his lab than Vickie had. But it was still damned sketchy.
According to FBI and Defense Department records, Dr. Alfonso Pena had been working in biological warfare studies almost all his life. Never mind that biowar research was officially renounced by all the major nations more than a generation ago. Never mind that a treaty signed by the U.S. and ratified by the Senate has the force of law, and thus any research banned by treaty is actually illegal within the United States.
Pena had started as a brilliant, promising young biochemist more than half a century ago, accepted a
