by Robert Berke
"Do you believe in coincidences, Julian?" Gonzales asked cryptically.
"No. But I do believe in bad luck." Julian responded seriously.
"Call it what you will. I'm about to tell you a story, but before I do, I need to ask you one question. Do you trust me?"
"Have I ever had a choice?" Julian answered.
"The alternative would not have been pleasant." Gonzales answered without a hint of humor, "we're old men now, Julie, we're not going to have a lot more opportunities to save the world. Will you trust me again?"
Julian thought about it and looked hard into Gonzales' eyes as he tried to reason through his decision. He couldn't rationalize what he was about to say, but he said it anyway. "Sure," he said. "You kept your word to me for fifty years. Your credit is good here. I'm in."
Gonzales proceeded to reveal to Julian Waterstone all of the information which he had learned over the last few weeks. About the strange e-mail from Smith to Takahashi, the death of Ashkot, and the theory that Kovaretsky and Vakhrusheva were trying to unlock the codes from Ashkot's brain using Smith's just-announced technology.
"I know that name, ‘Vakhrusheva', don't I?" Julian asked.
"Jimmy Kornin." Gonzales replied. "Jimmy Kornin was Arkady Vakhrusheva. Now its his older brother, Vladimir. We've been watching him for years."
"Why are you telling me this?" Julian asked.
Gonzales looked him in the eye and said, "Because you have above-board access as a member of the press. You were there. You met people. You know this town. And because I trust you. And the last Vakhrusheva to cause us trouble...well, I couldn't have done it without you. Hopefully this time, I won't have to blow anyone up."
For a moment--just a fleeting moment--Julian didn't wish he was dead.
"I may be more 'in' than you think." Julian said drawing out Takahashi's business card with Kitty's name written across the top. "I know this girl. She works for Smith's personal lawyer."
"Shall we invite her for lunch tomorrow?" Gonzales asked, looking at the business card and, by long habit, memorizing every detail of it. "My treat."
Julian smiled. Something exciting was about to happen. When it happened in Korea, he had the rest of his life in front of him and the last thing he wanted was excitement and danger. He just wanted to get home alive. Now, he realized, he was hoping for it. "I'm in no position to be turning down free lunches," he replied, smiling for the first time since he had opened his door.
"Good," Gonzales said. "Consider yourself deputized again. If you lose track of me and need to be protected, call this number." Gonzales handed him a business card with nothing but a phone number on it. "Now remember, this is simply information gathering, not recruitment. As far as she is concerned, we're just journalists writing a follow up article about the technology. Nothing else. At this point, we don't know if or how far the Russians have infiltrated. For all we know, this girl could be working for them. I want to know who's in the inner circle, what the relationships are. I'll need to make a hierarchy chart, figure out who knows what, and who the next person to speak with is. We need to build trust. Not a hint of anything else. Understand?"
"Yes, sir." Julian replied. He had just been recruited as an operative. He remembered how terrified he was when he was recruited as an operative in Korea. How he nearly pissed his pants with each falsified report and each untrue answer he gave in the official inquiries. He remembered the years spent wondering if some investigation would reveal his lies and bring the truth to light; the years spent worrying about the consequences and knowing that his fate was inextricably in the hands of a man he barely knew, who worked for an agency he couldn't name. Now, some fifty years later, he learned for the first time that he had made the right choice, that he done the right thing, and that he trusted the right man. Now, some fifty years later the prospect of doing it again was met with only the slightest tickle of apprehension.
Before night had fully darkened the sky, Hermelinda turned up the long driveway into the parking lot at County General Hospital. Hermelinda knew how to get a patient released to her care and knew that she wouldn't have any trouble with County General. They were always happy to discharge mental patients. It was just a matter of paperwork. She had procured Dr. Bayron's medical emergency card that was on file at SmithCorp and had procured it with one quick phone call to Human Resources. When it was first handed to her, she noticed that both the emergency contact and next-of-kin lines were blank. Though it puzzled her for a moment, she quickly realized how much easier that would make it for her. After she parked outside the hospital she drew a pen from her purse and simply wrote her own name in on both lines. She walked into the hospital confidently. She had begun her career in this hospital and always felt welcome.
After just moments in the administrative office, Hermelinda was being escorted down a long cement corridor. It was a corridor she had walked many, many times before in her first years as a nurse. It was here that she had developed every skill needed to care for the helpless. It was clean and orderly. There were rules, and schedules, and clipboards. The patients were easy to commoditize, you didn't get too attached. It was comforting. But it was no place for her friend. She was afraid what Dr. Bayron's condition might be. No family, no emergency contact. She and Smith and Myra and his team at the office-- were they really all he had?
She didn't even have to look at his chart to know that he had suffered a psychotic break, she had figured that out from the little information Myra had given her. The orderly who was escorting her motioned to a room off of the hallway and she was immediately relieved. Dr. Bayron was sitting on the edge of his hospital bed, dressed and clean shaven. She didn't know what condition she would find him in, but she did not expect to find him neatly dressed and alert.
"Hello stranger," she said simply.
Hermelinda noticed that he looked past her. There was no eye contact. If she had a chart, if she were there as a nurse and not as a friend, she would have made a note about that. "I'm going to take you to the infirmary at the SmithCorp Building. Alice and I can watch you there until you're ready. I already have your discharge papers and your medications."
"I had a psychotic break." He said, confirming Hermelinda's diagnosis while still looking past her. "It's quite interesting from the inside. Different from what we see on the outside." Hermelinda noticed that he said these words very slowly.
"Do you have any personal items here, Doug?" She asked.
"No." He answered. He was looking at his shoes. "I was wearing this when they brought me." He looked up at Hermelinda. She was turned away from him looking through the drawers to make sure nothing was left behind. "Dr. Beedle was a student of mine once. He knows you."
"Is that your doctor?" She asked, her back still to him. "He's a real gentleman. I learned a lot from him."
"He's my doctor." He said, looking back down at his shoes. "It's very embarrassing. The cobbler's children have no shoes. I had some time-bombs inside, I guess."
"Well it sounds like you are able to view your symptoms objectively now."
Dr. Bayron looked back up to see Hermelinda looking at him. He looked into her eyes. They were sad, but they gave him comfort. She noticed the eye contact and felt that maybe, just maybe, he was going to be all right. "Yes and no," he responded. "I couldn't move, couldn't act. My conscious thoughts were real, my intelligence was working, but it was like a short circuit, or even a blown fuse. Every thought, no matter how fully formed, eventually devolved into one single thought. There was never a point at which I didn't know where I was or what I was doing. I just couldn't do anything about it. It was like a paralysis."
"Come on, I'll take you back. There'll be plenty of time to talk and rest and get a handle on whatever it was that happened. You'll be among friends." She extended her hand to help him off of the bed.
"I didn't tell Dr. Beedle anything." Bayron said with a tinge of guilt in his voice. He took her hand and she gave him a little tug. He came to his feet and they began walking dow
n the hall. His gaze was fixed straight ahead. He never let go of her hand.
"It's all public already, Doug. The press conference went as planned. You're famous. There was nothing to keep secret." Hermelinda said.
"We should have kept it secret," he replied and then began to look past her again.
Alice went back to the infirmary to make a double check before her patient arrived. She dutifully made sure everything was clean and that all traces of Mr. Smith's long convalescence there had been removed. She also had some training at a mental hospital and made sure there was nothing dangerous in the room. Satisfied that the room was safe, she walked out of the infirmary with its lead lined walls to a bathroom down the hall.
She pulled out her cellphone and made a quick phone call. "They found Bayron. He's coming back today."
CHAPTER XV.
The Steak and Ale was one of Julian's favorite restaurants and his greatest journalistic tool. He had been going there for years. He had extracted a career's worth of newsworthy information by bringing interview subjects to this restaurant. The dining room was dark and noisy. The booths were cozy and the benches were covered in stiff red vinyl. The drink glasses never stayed empty. The atmosphere simply demanded one more glass of wine or one more beer or one more cocktail. At the Steak and Ale Julian found it easy to loosen up his subjects. Gonzales approved.
Julian called Kitty and told her that he wanted to do a follow up story about what had been unveiled at the press conference and was looking for a different angle. He was hoping she would help and in any event, he said, he wanted to buy her lunch because she was so nice to him at the SmithCorp Building. Kitty said she would have to ask Sam Takahashi if it was okay for her to talk to the press. Julian said he understood and asked her to call him back.
He didn't wait long. His phone rang just a few minutes later. She would be happy to meet him at the Steak and Ale.
They arranged to meet at 12:30 p.m. the following afternoon.
Gonzales picked Julian up at his home at 12:15 and they arrived at the restaurant right on time. Josey Cruz was already there sitting alone at a table on the far side of the restaurant. An invisible exchange took place between Gonzales and Cruz. With small gestures unnoticeable to anyone else, Cruz let Gonzales know that he had arrived early and made sure the restaurant was secure and Gonzales let Cruz know that everything was going as planned. Kitty showed up at 12:40. Cruz was surprised when he saw her. They had told him that she was young and pretty, but they had not told him quite how young pretty. She had been using Myra as her template for how a professional woman should dress and she had chosen an excellent template. She met the men at the restaurant wearing a skirted business suit with a white shirt and medium heels. Had she not been described to him before, Cruz was certain he would have mistaken her for lawyer at a prestigious firm.
Julian introduced Gonzales as Bill Ortega, another reporter from the Gazette, and asked if she minded if he joined them. Gonzales extended his hand toward Kitty and said, "just call me Bill." Kitty shook his hand reluctantly. Julian read her body language instantly and recognized her nervousness. Without pause he added, "You know our publisher almost never approves expense requests for stuff like this, so when one of us gets approval, we all try to get our friends in for the free meal. I seriously hope you don't mind." Julian and Gonzales both noticed her hand relax into the handshake and both knew that Julian had disarmed her.
Kitty trusted Julian. In the past he had always looked so sad to her. Today he looked different. He looked energetic. He looked like the kind of man who might actually want a lap dance.
Steaks were ordered. Julian ordered his usual, the bone-in ribeye and a tall Guinness Stout. Gonzales ordered a Filet Mignon and Dewar's on the rocks. Kitty had the Petite Ribeye and a glass of water. "Have a glass of wine," Julian insisted. "The paper's paying for it, you might as well live a little." He didn't wait for Kitty to assent. He told the waiter to bring her a glass of the house red.
Julian pulled a small spiral-bound pad out of his back pants pocket and opened it in front of him. He pulled a pen from his shirt pocket, and a small pair of reading glasses from his jacket pocket and arranged them on his nose. This was all for show. Julian knew that Gonzales would be recording the whole interview. Julian looked over the top rim of his glasses at Kitty. She looked so commanding in her tailored business suit that he had to squint to recognize her as the cute little stripper from the Moviestar Topless. He cleared his throat.
"So what I'm really looking for here," he started, "is some kind of human interest angle on this whole Smith, artificial brain thing. My readers don't really care about the science behind it, and I'm not smart enough to deal with the philosophical implications, so I though I might try to write a piece about how all this plays out at home. Maybe like how it effects his family and his relationships? While everyone seems focused on the bigger picture, I think there may be something interesting in the little day-to-day details. Maybe to write about the people who are actually affected personally. What do you think?"
Kitty leaned back to let the waiter place her glass of wine in front of her. She took a small taste as the waiter served the other drinks. Gonzales raised his glass and said, "to free lunch!" Julian raised his glass and said "hear, hear." Kitty blushed a little, embarrassed that she had drunk from her glass before everyone had their drinks. She knew she still had some social graces to practice. She took a larger sip after the toast hoping they would understand that the second sip was the real sip and the first was just a taste.
"So what do you think of my idea?" Julian prodded.
Kitty dabbed the corners of her lips with the corner of a napkin as she had seen Myra do after drinking. She thought for a moment. "Well, Mr. Waterstone, I don't think he has any family besides Hermelinda and the baby, and ..." She stopped speaking suddenly. She didn't want to say what she was thinking. Please don't push, she prayed.
"And what?" Julian pushed.
"I shouldn't say. It's personal, and I don't really know." Kitty evaded the question.
"About the marriage? About the baby? That's all common knowledge already." Julian gambled, hoping to get something juicy. What about the marriage? What about the baby? He wondered. He would sneak back to that topic after a second glass of wine. The art of the interview: Julian knew that if he played it right he was going to get a something, and he knew he was going to play it right. He'd been doing this for a long, long, time. He veered away from the subject. "So there's no other family at all?" he asked.
"I don't think so," Kitty answered.
"Well what about his inner circle? His staff? There must be other people who are close to him."
Kitty thought for a moment. "Okay," she said, "there's Sam Takahashi, for one. They've been friends all their lives. I think they've known each other from elementary school. Honestly, I think that's Mr. Smith's only real friend. At least I know Mr. Takahashi considers Mr. Smith to be his closest friend. He showed me a scar once and said that he and Mr. Smith had identical ones from when they decided they were blood brothers. It's pretty gross actually," she said wrinkling her nose to make the point. "That's the only friend I know. He just loves Mr. Smith to death. He was the guy who ran the service the other day. He's an older Japanese guy, but he's a real party animal when he gets a few drinks in him. You can take my word for that."
Kitty paused and watched Julian scribbling in his notebook. Julian looked up to let her know that he wanted her to continue, which she did happily.
"Hermelinda used to be his nurse, and then, you know, I guess they became lovers and got married. You saw her too. And they have a baby. Then there's Myra, that's Smith's personal assistant. She was there too. She's real smart and super classy. Everybody respects her. She pretty much runs all of SmithCorp now. I mean Smith still does all the thinking and stuff, but Myra's sort of like his avatar. Did you see that movie?"
"No," Julian smiled, "but I know what you mean."
"There's Dr. Bayron, of course. You know he
just kind of disappeared. I know he and Mr. Smith were also real close. Smith hired a private investigator to look for him, but he seems real confident that he'll come back. Hermelinda insisted that they hire an investigator. She really likes him too."
"So you've met Dr. Bayron?" Julian asked.
"Oh, yes! A couple of times when I was helping put together the press conference. He was supposed to be kind of the centerpiece. He seemed real, real, nervous about speaking in public though. I thought maybe he chickened out at the last minute."
"So what is Dr. Bayron like? You know, as a person?" Julian persisted.
"Oh, he's real nice. Quiet. He seems, well I guess a little lost at times. Like his mind is thinking about other stuff all the time. He's like a real genius. Like a character. I like him, but he really needs a wife." Kitty chuckled and took another sip of wine.
Julian took a long draw from his beer too. "Anyone else?"
"Ummm," Kitty thought hard, "there's the guy they call Sharky. I never met him, but I once heard Dr. Bayron mention that Smith was real fond of him. Oh! And then there's Alice. That's the other nurse. She's real funny. She's this little Filipina lady who just talks and talks and talks. She's the one with all the gossip! If you want gossip, you should take her to lunch. She also once asked me to volunteer at the Jewish nursing home on Washington Avenue. I thought that was weird, but I might do it anyway. It seems like a nice thing to do." Kitty paused to think again and shook her head.
Julian asked, "that's it?"
"Maybe you could call me inner circle, maybe. From what I've seen I'm probably next on the list. You know that Mr. Smith hired me personally. He's a very nice man. He's very funny. I mean, I didn't meet him until after he, you know, died and all, but he made me laugh. Mr. Takahashi writes my paycheck, but I'm sure its Mr. Smith who's keeping me around. So I guess he likes me too." She stopped and searched her mind again. "Yeah, I think that's it. I can't think of anyone else." Kitty concluded.
