Brother Termite Page 19

  Reen stared at Oomal, Oomal the Conscience, Oomal who was burdened now with upholding the law. “I don’t know.”

  “You have to know, Reen. I know you know.”

  Zoor’s entrance saved Reen from answering.

  “Zoomer,” Oomal said, getting to his feet. “Round up two or three Helpers and meet us at the ship.”

  Reen’s heart sank. He followed his Brother’s quick stride from the East Wing and to one of the small Michigan commuter ships. “Why do you suspect Marian?” Reen asked.

  “We did a fly-by of the entire border of China. There were no troops massed there. If there were no troops, Reen, and if Womack signed the tariff bill, what are those tanks doing still stationed in front of the White House?”

  Reen looked at the fence. The soldiers were staring at them. The cannons of the tanks were pointed at the street, but they could just as easily be turned. They could ...

  “Just before Hopkins died,” Oomal went on, “he was trying to tell us something. Something about Marian. And she got rid of her competition very conveniently, don’t you think? We go to Camp David, and Kapavik’s already dead. She tells you Hopkins is behind it all, and you kill Hopkins before he can tell his side.”

  Reen tore his anxious gaze from the tanks. “His side? We know Hopkins’s side. He admitted it. You heard him. We all heard him.”

  The door of the ship spread open, and Oomal threw himself into the navigation seat, leaving Reen to crawl around him to the back. “I heard him admit to killing Womack and Jonis. That’s all I heard. He never said he kidnapped the others. Besides, if Marian was so worried about what Hopkins was doing, why didn’t she just come out and tell you earlier?”

  “Maybe she was frightened,” Reen said miserably as he watched Zoor herd three Loving Helpers out the door and across the lawn to the ship.

  “That doesn’t solve the problem of why the humans haven’t talked. Or why the other Cousins were kidnapped. Come on, come on, Zoomer,” Oomal said anxiously under his breath.

  “Maybe Hopkins kidnapped the Cousins to put more pressure on Tali, Cousin Brother.”

  The Helpers began to file into the ship, taking their places behind Reen. When Zoor got into his seat, Oomal jerked the command ball upward, and the ship shot into the air.

  “You don’t believe that,” Oomal replied.

  No, Reen didn’t believe that. But in the press of other dilemmas he had put the problem of the kidnappings out of his mind.

  “It was a good thing that you saved Marian from Tali,” Oomal went on. “If he killed her, we’d never learn the whole truth. But we’ll have to talk to her sooner or later, and when that time comes, I want you to tell me where I can find her. And don’t lie to me, okay? You know that frequency like a human baby knows its mother’s breast. And when I ask for it, I want you to give me that frequency, understand?”

  Reen watched the noon traffic on Route 50. The spidery winter trees of the Virginia countryside flashed by. He had always said he would kill Marian if she proved too dangerous, but he had lied to the Community. He had lied to himself. “I took the transmitter out of her two years ago.”

  “What?” Oomal tore his eyes from the controls to glare at Reen. “You did what?”

  Zoor flung himself across Oomal and righted the ship before it could dive.

  “There was no sense in keeping it in her. Angela was a viable embryo.”

  “Goddamned Marian was the CIA director! You made her CIA director, Cousin Brother! And you thought it would be a nice idea to let her walk around unsupervised?”

  “Watch where you’re flying, Oomal,” Zoor said quietly. “Can you just watch where you’re flying?”

  Oomal took back the controls and looked out the window. “We passed it. We’re halfway to fucking West Virginia. Shit on a stick.” He jerked the ship around so fast that the angle overrode the baffles. Reen was flung into a wall with a thump.

  They flew to the National Wildlife Federation in silence and didn’t speak as the ship settled into the parking lot beside the red-brick building.

  The Cousins left the Helpers on board and went up the long sweeping concrete ramp to the entrance. In the huge lobby two receptionists sat behind a doughnut-shaped desk where two young raccoons were playing.

  “May I help you?” one of the women asked while a raccoon went through her Rolodex with its quick, inquisitive fingers.

  Reen found himself staring at the bandit eyes, the furry banded tails. It looked as if the animals had been placed there as part of the Wildlife Federation decor.

  “The director, please,” Oomal told her in a no-nonsense tone.

  Near the second receptionist, the second raccoon had managed to pull out a drawer and was trying to fit its body between the hanging files.

  The first receptionist whispered into the phone, then turned brightly to Oomal. “He’s on his way.”

  A thud from the drawer. The raccoon had apparently gained entrance. Neither receptionist paid any attention to the animals, as if the raccoons, like Reen himself, were sentenced to invisibility.

  People sat on chairs lined up near the windows. A man who looked like a farmer waited next to a cardboard box that periodically made a mew ling sound. A housewife sat holding a plaster cast of a hoof.

  “Good afternoon!” a boisterous bass voice said. Making his way across the carpet, hand out, was a friendly looking bald man in a dark suit. “I’m Ralph Gunnerson. What can I do for you?”

  Oomal stepped forward and shook the man’s hand. “You can tell us why the National Wildlife Federation’s number was found in papers that belonged to a murder victim.”

  Gunnerson’s rosy skin went pale from cheek to scalp. “I think,” he said, licking his lips nervously, “we’d better talk in private.”

  The Cousins followed the director through a room of secretaries. In the back of the building Gunnerson ushered them into a large paneled conference room and sank into a raspberry-colored velour chair. “First off,” he said, “you have to guarantee all of us protection. All our wives, all our kids.”

  Reen kept silent. Across the table from him, Zoor sat mystified.

  “Promise me,” Gunnerson urged. “You have to promise.”

  Oomal nodded.

  Gunnerson passed an unsteady hand over his forehead.

  “Look. We’re dedicated to animals. Everyone here loves animals. It’s a job requirement. I get choked up when I see a bald eagle. I’ve seen one of our staff bawl when someone brought in a wounded deer.” He stopped, as though either afraid or ashamed to go on.

  Oomal said gently, “Continue, Mr. Gunnerson.”

  “It was the men.” The director picked at a nail.

  “What men?” Reen asked.

  “I don’t know. I don’t know who they were. They wanted animals. You see how people bring in wild animals. They bring them in all the time. I don’t know why. It’s not like we’re a zoo. But we never turn an animal away. We’ve had coyotes, rattlesnakes, you name it. If they’re hurt, we patch them up. If they’re sick, we tend to them until they’re well. Then we take them back to the wild and let them go.”

  The director picked at the nail until he brought up a bead of crimson blood.

  “The men,” Oomal prompted.

  Gunnerson’s head bobbed. “They wanted wild animals. I told them no. I started getting phone calls late at night. Threatening calls. They harassed my wife at work. At the store. It got so she was afraid to go out. They followed my children.” His lower lip trembled. Tears gathered in his eyes. “They...” His voice lowered. “They raped one of our assistants.”

  “You don’t know who they were?” Reen asked after a decorous pause.

  “No. But they came every day to see if we had animals. If we had any, they’d take them. I had to give up the animals. You can see that, can’t you? I was responsible for my staff. I c
ouldn’t let anybody else be hurt. Then one day, about three years ago, the men stopped coming. About four months after the men left, I found a bug in my office. It was poorly hidden, so I’m sure I was supposed to find it. A reminder not to talk. When AT&T installed our new phone system last year, they said there were indications that someone was tapping our lines. I don’t know what the men did with the animals, but I imagine ...” His voice trailed off, and he swallowed hard.

  Oomal asked, “When did these men start taking your animals?”

  “Five–no, six years ago. It started six years ago.”

  “Do you have any idea who they are?”

  Gunnerson let his breath out in a sigh. His body sagged. “You might ask the SPCA. One of our receptionists came from there, and after the men stopped coming to us, she said the SPCA started having problems with them, too.”

  AT THE Fairfax County SPCA a well-dressed woman filled out forms at a counter while on the other side stood a lanky young man with a beard and ponytail. The building stank of disinfectant. A cacophony of muffled yips and meows came from behind double doors.

  Run, Reen thought suddenly. We should run as far and as fast as we can. Because what we find out here won’t be about Tali and Hopkins at all but about something else. Something I don’t want to know.

  The two people looked up as the Cousins entered.

  “The director, please,” Oomal said.

  The young man behind the counter indolently scratched his cheek. “You don’t want to adopt, do you? I mean, I don’t know that we could clear that.”

  The woman wore an expensive fake fur, and she was eyeing Reen analytically and somewhat contemptuously, as if Reen were a mangy prospective pet.

  “We want to speak with the director.” Oomal snapped his finger on his claw. “Now.”

  Suddenly the double doors burst open, and a petite young woman in an apron came through, holding the collar of a golden retriever. When the dog saw the Cousins, he staggered back a few feet in astonishment and then, perhaps considering some aspect of canine integrity, lunged forward. The dog had a bark that made the walls tremble.

  The girl held on. “Down!” she shouted. The dog paid her no heed.

  Reen, the closest to the dog, shrank from the yellow snapping teeth, the frantic scrabbling of claws on linoleum, and the harsh panting as the animal strained against its collar.

  “Harry,” the girl said in exasperation.

  Harry opened a swing latch in the counter and sauntered out to the dog.

  “Door to the right,” he said over his shoulder.

  Oomal and Zoor fled through the steel doorway, Reen not far behind.

  On a dusty cabinet in the main office of the SPCA a phone was ringing. The two typists in the room paid no attention to it.

  “The director?” Oomal asked.

  A typist looked up from her ancient Selectric, a myopic editor’s frown on her face. “Go on back,” she said, jerking her head in that direction.

  The Cousins made their way past a mountain of dog food that sandbagged one side of the room. To the left of the Purina was an unassuming door, the kind that might lead to a bathroom or mop closet. Behind it was a scarred metal desk and a pile of manila folders paperweighted by a slumbering calico cat. And behind the folders was an impressive battleship of a woman, who said, “What the hell do you want?” in a voice not unlike the retriever’s.

  Awakened, the cat gave the Cousins a sleepy double take, then leaped off the folders, scattering the top two inches of the stack onto the threadbare carpet. The cat vanished, a streak of white, black, and russet, into a dark back room.

  That’s how I should run, Reen thought. I should run as though all the nightmares humans ever dreamed were at my heels.

  Oomal took the only available chair, a cheap steel and plastic thing. “Somebody’s been threatening you. They’ve been taking animals.”

  The woman blinked. “Lots of animals. Hundreds of animals. You going to get the bastards?”

  “Who are they?” Oomal asked.

  “Russians,” the woman said. She leaned back in her chair and laced her hands across a generous belly. “Germans. A few Latin Americans.”

  Reen asked, “How can you be so sure?”

  She gave him a sour smile. “Got a master’s in linguistics. They speak English well enough, but I can tag ‘em. I can always tag ‘em.”

  “They still come around?” Oomal asked.

  “Not for a couple of days. So you know who they are?”

  “Yes,” he said quietly.

  “They’re doing experiments on the animals, aren’t they?”

  “I think so.”

  “Castration’s too good,” she said by way of suggestion. The Cousins left. In the secretarial area the phone was still ringing, but the dog and the fake-furred woman had disappeared from the lobby. Under the stares of the girl and the pony tailed man, the Cousins exited and made their way to the ship.

  “So you know who’s been taking the animals?” Reen asked his Brother.

  The ship’s door spread open in welcome. Zoor took a wordless seat in the back. Reen sat next to Oomal.

  “The CIA,” Oomal said.

  Apprehension crawled, dainty-footed and insectile, up Reen’s spine. “How can you be sure?”

  “Because,” Oomal said as the ship lifted into clear, bright air, “when the consolidation hit, the CIA merged with the KGB, North Korean intelligence, and every thug in every crappy little police state south of the American border. I know who’s been taking those animals because I know the FBI is xenophobic. The FBI has stayed as all-American as goddamned apple pie.”

  Reen remembered Hopkins’s accusation of Marian at the last NSC meeting. Start investigating at Langley. Too bad that Reen had not believed him until it was too late.

  Twenty-eight of the Community, both Loving Helpers and Cousins, had been kidnapped–and it all started the same time the confiscation of animals at the SPCA began.

  CIA HEADQUARTERS, tucked between parks on the west and the Potomac on the north, looked more imposing from the ground than from the air. In fact, flying in low from the northwest, Reen could hardly see the massive installation until the ship was nearly on top of it.

  As they approached, Zoor said, “There’s nobody in the guardhouse.”

  “I know.” Oomal’s voice was tense.

  Reen studied the rolling tree-studded lawn of the complex. No one moved on the walkways. No one was outside to catch the last gleam of the Indian summer sun.

  And the parking lot was empty.

  Oomal settled the ship on the lawn. “Get the Loving Helpers, Zoomer.”

  The Cousins and Helpers climbed out and walked through the porte cochere to the huge brick building. The lobby was brightly lit. No guard sat at the station; no receptionist sat at the desk. The building was so silent that Reen could hear the whisper of air through heating ducts and the far, faint hum of a PC.

  The corridor was a deserted river of beige carpet banded by sun slanting from western windows. Somewhere in the bowels of the building a phone was ringing. Ringing. In the SPCA, the ringing had been part of the din. Here, it was a hammer tapping against brittle silence.

  The three halted before a red EXIT sign. The phone rang again.

  “Let’s not get on the elevators. No telling what traps they’ve set up.” Oomal opened the steel door, and they entered the stairwell.

  As Reen mounted the first step, Oomal snagged his sleeve. Reen turned and saw a look of determined, fearful intensity, as though Oomal were an exorcist about to enter a haunted house. “Downstairs.”

  Oomal was right. Downstairs. When humans wanted to hide something, they went to basements. They went to ground.

  No one spoke. The only sound in the stairwell was the slippery, soft steps of booted feet, the feathery echoes of breathing. At the bottom
, in a pool of shadows, Zoor fumbled for the knob.

  “Do you hear something?” Oomal asked, holding out his hand to stop them.

  Reen froze. In the dim light he could see Zoor’s eyes move back and forth as though searching by sight for the noise.

  “No,” Reen said at last. He grasped the knob and opened the door into fluorescent brilliance.

  The fourth level of the basement was a rabbit warren of offices, all empty. A door to the right was open, and on its painted steel surface were the words CLEAN ROOM. Reen walked inside. The telexes were silent, their power lights off. On a small table sat a red phone, its receiver a foot or so away. A persistent waa-waa came from the speaker, the Chesapeake Bay Bell reminder that the phone was off the hook.

  Reen heard Oomal’s faint “Reen? Come here.”

  Someone had slipped a tumbler into a door marked RESTRICTED, and it was standing ajar. Past the security-card access was a long linoleum hall where Oomal stood. Reen made his way down the corridor to his Brother and looked at an office plaque. At first the name didn’t register. Nothing registered. Not the implications of it, not his Brother standing next to him. Then Reen’s head started to pound.

  DR. HOWARD FRANKLIN, PROJECT SUPERVISOR

  “He was working for the CIA, too,” Oomal said. “Working for them the whole time, and she never told you. Now you know who was important to her and why, Cousin Brother. Now you see–”

  A muffled cry. “Zoor?” Oomal called.

  “Here, Cousin! Here! It’s ...”

  Oomal hurried toward Zoor’s voice, Reen lagging behind. The corridor led to a huge room that held the earthy stench of a zoo. Under the stench was a cloying odor, sweet and at the same time metallic.

  This room, like the SPCA, must once have rung with barks and plaintive questioning meows. Now it was silent. Dead animals lay in their screen cages, forlorn bits of bloodied fluff. A thick crimson sea, just beginning to congeal to black, ran down the sloping floor to a center drain. The Helpers, oblivious, stood in the pool of blood, amidst the carnage. Zoor, his face anguished, was trying to call them to higher, cleaner ground.