In The House Of Secret Enemies

That much I told the police. The detective in charge dutifully noted my opinions in his notebook and went about his business; Garth showed up later and backed me into a corner. I got him off my back by promising to come in to see him with everything I knew, after I made one more stop. That didn't do much to pacify him, but it gave me time to catch one of the shuttle flights out of Kennedy Airport to Boston.

I knew it was useless trying to talk to any of the officials at Platte. If they talked to me at all, they'd have nothing but glowing reports for Smathers. That was the way the academic game was played; screw up, and you were asked to resign; resign, and nobody has anything but good things to say about you.

I went to the best source of information I could find, the janitor who worked in the Psychology Department.

I landed back at Kennedy at one the next afternoon and got my car out of the parking lot. It was time to report to Garth, and then to Barnum to warn him about the approaching storm. Instead, I put in a call to Garth's office and left a message for him to meet me at my university office in an hour. Then I drove back to the campus and parked in front of Marten Hall.

Mrs. Pfatt was in her usual good form; she looked as though she'd gained weight during her day off. 'I told you before that Dr. Smathers does not see visitors.'

'He'll see me this time,' I said pointedly. 'You tell him I just came back from Platte Institute.'

Mrs. Pfatt bridled a bit, but she finally called Smathers on the intercom. Her face went through a series of changes as she talked to him. She hung up the phone and stared at me as though I'd just performed a miracle.

'Dr. Smathers will see you, Dr. Frederickson,' she said with a new ring of respect in her voice. 'He's in his laboratories upstairs. He'd like you to come up.'

I went up. The steel door was unlocked. I opened it and went up the soundproofed stairway. Smathers was in the first office. I made a point of checking to make sure that the other offices and labs were empty, then went in to see him.

'You know,' he said without looking at me.

'I know that you got pressured to leave Platte because you insisted on performing experiments that had been legally and medically forbidden to you.'

'Why are you doing this to me?'

I showed him a photostat of my license. 'Besides being a criminology professor, I'm also a private detective. I was hired to investigate you.'

'Who hired you?'

'Sorry. I won't tell you that.'

The fire in Smathers' eyes went out as quickly as it had flared. 'They were fools,' he said hollowly. 'I'm surrounded by fools.

I'm on the verge of a very important discovery-a profound medical breakthrough-and they will not leave me alone.'

'You've discovered a cure for the common cold?'

'Don't mock me, Dr. Frederickson. I can cure drug addiction and alcoholism, along with a number of other things that plague modern man.'

'You do all this by puncturing a man's eardrums?'

His eyes dropped. 'You know about that, too?'

'I can guess that Bayard T. Manning was the subject for some of your experiments. Willingly or unwillingly, I don't know. I do know he ended up dead.'

'Manning was paid,' Smathers said. 'You see, I have discovered a cure for alcoholism. Alcoholism, like drug addiction, is primarily a psychological problem, despite the physical changes that take place as a result of dependence. The problem is one of the mind. I can literally remake a mind, erase those problems-'

'By erasing his mind.'

'That's simplistic! To begin with, the minds of the people I'm talking about have been rendered worthless anyway. These men and women are no good to themselves, or to anyone else. Don't moralize to me!'

'The thought never crossed my mind.'

Smathers took a deep breath. 'Sensory deprivation, combined with other forms of therapy, can literally destroy a man's craving for drugs and alcohol. It can remove the root psychological causes and make a man or woman whole again, a rational, intelligent human being.' He paused, picked up a pencil and began to roll it back and forth between his thumb and forefinger. Guilt was beginning to rise in his voice, like steam from a hot spring. 'Manning originally came here of his own accord, in exchange for the money we offered him. Part of our treatment involved sound therapy, the use of certain tones as a therapeutic device. One day while Manning was on the machine he became frightened and touched some controls. The resulting frequencies punctured his eardrums. We would have treated him, but he escaped soon after that. I knew he would probably go to the authorities, so I was getting ready to go myself. When I heard he'd been killed, there didn't seem much point.'

'Convenient, wasn't it?'

Smathers' head jerked around. 'What does that mean?'

His indignation had the ring of sincerity. I sidestepped. 'Did it ever occur to you that the same techniques you use to treat drug addiction could be used to alter a man's political beliefs and behavior?'

'Don't be melodramatic, Frederickson. I'm a scientist, not a politician.'

'How did you team up with Dr. Kee?'

'I don't think I have to answer any more of your questions.'

'That's right, you don't.'

He answered it anyway. 'I knew that Dr. Kee had worked for the Chinese Army during the Korean War. That seemed irrelevant now. He is an expert in induced aberrational psychology. He is the only man in the world who knows enough to assist me.'

'How did he come to assist you?'

'I was at a conference in Poland and it was made known to me through intermediaries that Kee wished to come to the United States and work with me. I jumped at the chance. He came to me soon after that.'

I grunted. 'Smathers, your brilliance is matched only by your naivete.' I expected him to get angry, but he didn't. Perhaps it was all coming home to him now; his blind passion for his work had pulled him down a long, very dark passageway, and only now was he beginning to see the ugly things at the end. 'I'll bet that a little checking would turn up the fact that Kee is in this country illegally, hiding behind your reputation. He's here brushing up on the latest brainwashing techniques so he can go home and use them on his own people.'

'You realize, my work is very important. Perhaps you don't fully understand how important.'

I gave him the tag line. 'I think Kee killed two men.'

'Impossible!'

'I think he killed Manning, and I think he killed Fred Haley, an English professor who knew who Kee really was.'

Smathers' face suddenly drained of color. 'Mr. Haley was here just the other day. I saw him talking to. .' He let it trail off. 'What do you want me to do?'

'I want you to turn yourself in to the authorities before they come after you. My brother is a detective in the New York Police Department. He's waiting for me right now in my office. He doesn't know anything about this yet. You come and tell him your story. Things may end up easier for you.'

'Why should you want to help me?'

'Because I respect any man who's been awarded the Nobel Prize. Also, if your work is as important as you say it is, I'd like to see it continued. If it's true that your only crime is being incredibly stupid, perhaps you can rebuild your career when all the debts have been paid.'

I hadn't heard a sound, but the sudden jerk of Smathers' head and the look of alarm on his face was warning enough. I half turned in my seat and glimpsed a very large Chinese poised behind me. His eyes were great pools of darkness set in a field of flesh that might have been fine, yellow porcelain. I didn't get that much time to study him; his hand flicked forward and landed on the nape of my neck. Everything went dark. .