The Christmas Pudding Lie

by P. B. Phillips

  Fanatics abound. The competition for young, fresh, impressionable minds is fierce. In our story, the predator is the scout working for the intelligence community. And thus the mind games begin.”

  Anna interrupts, “What do you mean by mind games?”

  Mycroft smiles and answers, “Within the intelligence community, mind games refer to psych ops, psychological operations. We will get into the specifics down the line. Right now we are sketching in Lady Banks.”

  He continues, “Finding a Lady Banks takes time. It takes years for a scout to build a dossier on a potential Lady Banks.”

  Anna’s head tilts. Mycroft answers her silent question. “The scout is the master of covers. He may be the venerable don or the dashing youthful boy philosopher or even the highbrow independent feminist. These personae work especially well because they possess innate authority over the fledgling scholar.

  There are also scouts who work on the perimeters. Their typical guise is that of bookseller, publisher or tech rep.

  However, in the search for a Lady Banks, the real payload is the mine of psychological test results taken over the course of several years at university.”

  Mycroft spends the rest of the time introducing Anna to the core tenet in intelligence work, psychological operations. He explains,

  “It’s all war games today. And the battlefield is the ‘mind.’ You know it as control psychology. Be it in the corporate boardroom, a military hub, even the bedroom, intelligence is central. To know your target or your enemy is to live in their mind.”

  Mycroft’s intent here is to advance Anna’s awareness of the profound seriousness of Lady Banks’ plight in one swift motion. He argues, “And within the midst of these powerhouses of mind control, is our young, innocent, naive coed, Lady Banks.”

  Anna grows edgy with these images. Mycroft sees the look of distress. He knows that time is against him as well. He continues on, “Today it is all about profiling. It’s an exact science. The spy scout scours through mounds of diverse data looking for the perfect match to his Lady Banks profile.

  A complete psychological profile on Lady Banks will include attributes of a good company wife, beautiful or at the very least attractive, smart but not too smart. The agency does not want Lady Banks spying on their spy, so to speak.

  The scout looks for a capable Lady Banks but not competitive. They don’t want Lord Banks distracted. Lady Banks must be content to wait in the wings. Her husband must always command center stage.”

  Anna asks with innocence, “So Lady Banks is the moon?”

  Mycroft does not answer her directly. A wink of his eye suggests a ‘maybe.’

  He goes on, “Having given her full due as a fully operational wife I want to emphasize the most important criteria, the corner stone of every profile of Lady Banks which is termed as ‘emotional vulnerability.’”

  Anna interrupts to ask, “Wait before you go there, I have a question. I thought that personal files were closed and confidential. What gives here? This bothers me. ”

  Mycroft nods zealously. He wants her to be fully engaged. He aims to engender dialogue. He sets her straight,

  “I dare say that notions of confidentiality are never more and maybe never were. Today, it is only a matter of when a hacker will compromise a system. Hackers are the touted warriors in cyberspace.

  But hacking aside, intelligence owns most of the relevant data. I dare say that three out of four psychological profiling tests conducted at university originate with one or another of the intelligence agencies. Well hell, the science of testing was the brainchild of the intelligence community. Intelligence networks operate as silent third party grantors. As I said, they engage and pay faculty and research assistants under the guise of grants to do their snooping.”

  Anna’s thoughts stray back to her early years at university. At one level, she knows that he is right. But she’s loath to admit it.

  He sees her processing the information with too much skepticism he thinks. “You don’t buy it?”

  She sighs. She tells him what’s on her mind. “No I understand. I spy. You buy! I got it. I get that Lady Banks must possess beauty, intellect, charm and be society savvy. It is the corner stone, the emotional wreck … it seems to be contradictory here?”

  She knows right now that she does not like Lady Banks. But she allows him to go on.

  Mycroft obliges, “Lady Banks’ emotional vulnerability stems from daddy issues.”

  Hearing this Anna stops him short again. “Whoa! I hope that this is not going where I think its going. I don’t give much due to the penis envy argument. You might want to move on to your next point.”

  Mycroft dashes about his long red mane. He anticipated this negative reaction. He readily answers,

  “Allow me to finish. The typical Lady Banks is daddy’s little girl. That is to say that Lady Banks craves daddy’s affection. Her every thought and action hinges on how it will play out for daddy.”

  Anna interrupts and bleats, “Every child does. And from the childhood traumas wrought in a father and son relationship what’s your point?”

  Mycroft replies, “My point refers specifically to the disconnect between Lady Banks and daddy. The telling mark in Lady Banks’ psychological profile is the ever-present emotional void. Lady Banks’ dad never provides her with validation. He can’t. The end result is that throughout her life, Lady Banks seeks to fill this void. But all is in vain.

  And why can’t Lady Banks get ‘no’ satisfaction? It is because daddy’s interests lay elsewhere. My point is that Lady Banks’ daddy should have married another daddy. Closet gay daddy prefers little boys.

  Lady Banks is out of the loop. She becomes the classic low self-esteem victim. This may or may not mean that she unconsciously covets a penis. That is not our concern here. What trips up Lady Banks is that this childhood patterning conditions her to seek out indifferent kind of guys. Thus the void, always the void.”

  Mycroft falls silent rather abruptly. His last words hang in the breeze that brushes Anna’s brow. She tries to get her head around this,

  “So Lady Banks has a penchant or should I say a weakness for gay men. And the spooks exploit this to their own advantage.”

  Mycroft turns to Anna and with a look of sadness replies, “That’s how it is.”

  Anna can’t see her way through this argument. She asks with exasperation, “How?”

  Mycroft is not ready to go there yet, “We’ll get to that. For now, remember Espionage is a morals free zone!”

  She nods, “So I am learning. However, I’m not convinced. You see my point is this. Homosexuality is man’s natural state and therefore the common denominator in all male-female relationships.”

  Mycroft asks incredulously, “Would you care to expand?”

  She speaks quite casually and candidly,

  “When you look at it straight, no pun intended, one of the key tenets of the history of man is that men prefer men. They are really tight about this. They organize themselves in male only groupings, be it military, religious, economic or social. Men prefer to be with men, it’s as simple as that. When they are not with them, they spend all their time watching and obsessing about them second hand.

  They go to extremes to maintain their male only enclaves. Women are secondary in every way. Men tolerate women in so far as they service the male libido, inflate the male ego and incubate their genetically flawed Y chromosome.”

  Mycroft now is feeling the hour. He didn’t expect this rebuttal. He lets out his hair and shakes it freely. He looks back at her and says, “Wow that is some indictment.”

  Outside, the shake rattle and roll of a lone lorry marks predawn London. Mycroft gets up and draws open the shimmering white taffeta drapes. He scours the ever-softening black sky, “London Traffic is waking up from its cat nap.

  Anna sees that the tarnished clock on the west wall affirms her suspicions. “Oh geez, look at the time! I really have to say good-bye. I loved every minute of our walk along
the Thames. I’m so sorry though that Doddie couldn’t join us. You will give him my very best. I’m sorry too that we have to cut this short. But we knew that time was against us”

  Mycroft is well prepared for this anticipated premature departure. His method is the element of surprise. Remaining calm, he directs her,

  “Stay on. I don’t know what your home situation is but you have yet to mention a mate. And you don’t strike me as the little old lady with a house full of feral cats.”

  The very idea of staying on was not on Anna’s radar screen. Her mouth unhinges slightly. She hesitates. Mycroft jumps in before she can formulate a rejection. He goes for broke. He plays his trump card.

  “Dodd insists that I convince you to stay on. You can’t go without seeing Dodd! He is expecting us at his country home.”

  Anna looks up at Mycroft and asks, “And when was all this decided?”

  Mycroft knows that he is on thin ice here, “Probably when you were crossing the Atlantic or maybe earlier. I am your proverbial messenger type.”

  Anna just shakes her head back and forth, “Doddie, he is a devil. I don’t doubt you. You should have said something earlier.”

  Mycroft sighs and hunches his shoulders, “It’s all Dodd’s doing. But that is neither here nor there now. You’ll come? Dodd’s place in Somerset is a must. He has this funky stone farmhouse and a few idyllic country guest cottages. He vows never to speak to me again, if I don’t persuade you. You see my predicament?

  The English countryside this time of year is a perfect spot to stir the cauldron of mystery. The summer tourists are all back working at their posts.”

  Anna tries to assess the unexpected, the totally out of the question. Utterly bewildered, she answers, “Get out! You’ve got to be kidding, right? You strike me as one who has a life. You have a business to run, don’t you? And as much as I would love to see Doddie, I think that I should stay the course here.

  While your tale of Lady Banks has strands of intrigue with interesting sexual undertows, in all honesty, I am not your man. This is not my bailiwick. ”

  Mycroft accepts this and asks, “We expect that you will have reservations at this stage. Will you grant that Lady Banks’ story warrants further talks? And as for you not being our man for the mission, Dodd can best address that concern. I dare say that you might be surprised. And I’m sure that you will cast Lady Banks’ secrets in a provocative light.

  If down the road, however, you decide to chuck the whole project, nothing is lost. I think that you will find that you are still in the plus column. I guarantee you a fun time at Dodd’s. You do want to see him?” Mycroft is confidant that Dodd will turn the tide on Anna’s objections.

  Anna takes in a deep breath and lets it out slowly and purposefully. She says hesitantly, “I don’t know what to say.” As no other argument emerges, she backtracks,

  “But you are right. It is too early in the story to make a judgment call. And I would like to know the story regardless. So I accept Doddie’s invitation. And if it will ease your mind, there’s not a soul waiting for me, not even a stray.”

  Mycroft is relieved that this hurdle is gone. He exclaims, “Great! Dodd will be over the moon. We can leave right away.”

  Anna, in her very best Pacino impersonation, cries again,

  “WHOA! I need to let the tour director know that I am staying on. And I need to book a return.”

  Mycroft understands and answers with great enthusiasm, “I’ll wait for you. It’s no bother.”

  The tips of her ears burn hot. She thinks that it is vital that she cut loose if only to get her head around the whole idea of staying on.

  “I would like to travel on my own, if you won’t be too offended. I’ll rent a car and meet you there, okay?”

  Mycroft grows worried. He wonders if this is not a hidden ploy to escape. And he is quite sure that she underestimates the challenge of the drive. He urges,

  “You do remember that we drive on the opposite side? Do you really want to drive solo? It’s almost 180 miles! I promise you that I won’t talk on or pry. The Slip Road is not what I call a tourist attraction.”

  “I want to try.”

  Mycroft invites Anna to keep her options open. “Right oh then. I’ll set off with the morning light. If you change your mind, for whatever reason, give me a call. I would enjoy your company on the ride down,”

  Anna’s fear radar subsides. She extends her hand and offers, “Thanks ever so, Mycroft. So all I need is Doddie’s address. I can get directions from the concierge.”

  As Mycroft writes down the information, she adds, “I really hope that there are no more surprises in store. The old gray mare ain’t what she used to be.”

  Mycroft hands Doc the slip of paper, “No surprises from me. I can’t speak for Dodd. As for Sherlock, I dare say that he’s always a mystery.”

  Anna reels ever so slightly with the news that Sherlock Holmes will be joining in the fun. Her paranoia wants to jump out and choke her. But Anna be damns it. Her curiosity trumps paranoia this time. She is determined to find out what gives or takes as the case may be.

  On her own again Anna attempts to get her bearings. Misgivings, second thoughts, and over all fear shout at her. ‘What the hell am I about? This can’t be good. This is one too many changes in plans! First Dodd comes back into my life, then a mystery cruise beckons from out of the blue, then subway bombers, then shanghaied by a PI, and now could it be the Big Bad Wolf called Sherlock? Shall I get out while I still can? I could be free and on the high seas before they realize that I’ve slipped out of the country.”

  But Anna refuses to run away this time. This is her last chance. She dismisses her second guessing mind. She harbors a faint hope of finding an answer to her very poignant question, is her life a lie.

  Back at the hotel, Anna runs into Mrs. Fletcher again. “Oh there you are, dear. Are you OKAY? We’ve been worried sick about you!”

  Before Anna can answer, the mystery aficionado rattles on, “Well you are here, thank God for that. You do know that we are about to shove off. And I’ll be glad to see the backside of this country. Don’t get me wrong. The people and the sights were worth the trip. It’s just this dreadful terrorists’ business. I was forever looking over my shoulder. How did you get on?”

  Anna replies, “Fine, in fact I am thinking on visiting the countryside.”

  Mrs. Fletcher, somewhat astonished, replies, “Are you really? Then you are in for a surprise. The tour director is soliciting anyone who wants to stay on. They’re offering some good deals. They are experiencing a sudden and unexpected spike in demand. You see these bombings made a lot of people jumpy. The waiting list of people who want to go to New York and points west grows as we speak. They are looking to fill those requests. Bon Voyage, dear.”

  Anna thrilled with this new twist can’t hear her conspiratorial mind knocking out the message ‘too much happenstance!’ She says her good-bye to Jessica, “I guess I’ll check in with the tour director. Have a safe trip home, Mrs. Fletcher. And if you see that Marlowe character, tell him I’ll catch him on the next wave. Thanks again.’’

  Mrs. Fletcher walks away saying, “Oh we haven’t seen Mr. Marlowe either. I do hope that the old man is all right. Now you be careful dear.”

  Anna rushes off to find the tour guide. As it is, the tour director finds her first.

  “Doc! Finally! I was getting worried. I’ve left countless messages. Would you like to extend your tour of London? We will provide lodgings and a free car rental for a whole week and of course your return.”

  Anna knows that this is too good to be true, but she can’t help herself. She accepts with no reservations. “Yes, I can stay on. I have no pressing matters back home. Where do I sign on?”

  “Come with me,” the tour director directs Anna to the front desk.

  They arrange to extend her reservation at Grosvenor House for another week. The tour director hands her the rental car keys.

  “If you will follo
w me, I can show you the car,” she points her in the direction of the hotel’s car park. The tour guide stops in front of a spanking new brilliant red and silver Mini Minor.

  “Will this do?” she asks.

  “I’ll say. These toy cars are everywhere.” Anna ogles the car.

  “Will you be going out of town?” the guide asks tentatively.

  “I will. It’s okay?” she asks quite seriously.

  “Oh yes, your papers are good throughout Europe but… ”

  The guide answers with a pinch of hesitation in her voice.

  “Just remember that here in England we drive on the left. You will be especially careful on the ring roads?”

  The tour director has second thoughts now. “You’re sure you are up to it? You might try driving around the square first; you know to get use to the new direction.”

  She really expected the portly old grandmother to refuse the rental. She never imagined that Anna would be planning a driving tour.

  “I’ll manage just fine. Thanks again. See you in a week then. Now to the concierge for maps…” Anna heads inside.

  Back in her room, she flops down on the bed. Suddenly, the exhaustion of weeks on rail, sea and foot falls back on her like a ton of bricks. Disoriented, she fears the onset of depression. She worries that these bouts of indecision and second-guessing are symptoms of senility at her door. Yet her new resolve to live without reservation prevails. She decides,

  “Digging up Lady Banks’ bones might find me with a curse upon my head. However, if I abandon her to the shadows of my mind, I will be forever wondering. So Wizard, I dare you! I’m old enough to know who I am and face up to who I was. And I just may lick my conspiratorial mind this time.”

  Anna acts with determination lest her inhibitions sabotage her restored self-confidence. She tries to order a to-do-list. “First, Ada! Right! I need to let her know that I’m staying on. Then it’s off to the English countryside and then maybe Paris. I have the car. I wonder how far the Chunnel is from Somerset.”