Up ahead the station revealed itself through the curtain of rain, high up. The locomotive slid into a murky tunnel beneath it and the cars came to a squeaking halt alongside a trainshed which captured the sound of the rain on a tin roof. Conklin raised up to peer out the window.
“Cincinnati,” he said. He reached for the porter’s bell, touched it. After a few moments that man knocked on the bedroom door and Conklin got up to unlock it, open it. “Get me a late paper if you can, please?”
Paul saw the porter come down the steps of their car and move along the platform. Without taking his eyes from the outside scene, he asked, “Do you think I’m going to have trouble?”
“Yes, frankly I do.”
“But why?” Why should anyone make trouble for him? “Mr. Breen . . . let us suppose there was but one known Cro-Magnon in all the world. Let us further suppose the Neanderthal leaders discovered that man, captured him, tied him with a rope and put his wits and skills to work for them. Nothing but trouble can come from such a situation.”
“I suppose so, but I don’t want to make trouble.”
“Not now, not yet,” Conklin repeated. “You will find Washington full of men like Captain Evans; big men, little men, many of them with intolerance and hate in their minds. Those few who will come to know you, will use you—and using you, hate you. That, too, disturbs me.” Paul turned from the window to stare curiously at the agent lying on the bed. He had discovered something about the man, something not shared with the F.B.I. operative now asleep in the upper bed. They regarded each other for long moments, oblivious of the outside sounds seeping into the room. In the semidarkness Paul smiled.
“You don’t hate me.”
“I do not,” Conklin replied instantly. “At this moment I neither like nor dislike you; I am neutral. I hope that I will not see fit to change my mind in the future. I cannot like you because you are alien to me.” Unexpectedly he returned the smile. “But no . . . I do not hate you.” And then he added, “I hope that I never will.”
The agent was frightened of him, Paul realized. It was no more than a small fright at the moment because the fantastic situation was new and unplumbed, had only taken root that afternoon in the captain’s office. To Paul’s unhappiness, he saw the fright growing with each passing hour. The longer Conklin discussed him and his special problem in his mind, the more frightening the predicament appeared. As yet, he saw Paul only as an invincible, invisible finger man—someone who might walk the streets with him, pointing out the enemies of the department and the nation, someone who could unerringly ferret out those who did not belong. But in the man’s subconscious there was another and greater fear which had not yet forced its way to the surface: Paul could know the minds of friends as well as enemies. If he could stand in a ballroom and expose the undercover activities of an embassy hireling, he could also walk through the offices of the War Department and know the most cherished secrets of a wartime world. That was lurking in Conklin’s subconsciousness and would make itself known before long. And the fear would grow.
The train began to move.
Paul looked to the door. “Your paper’s coming.”
Conklin only glanced at him and waited for the knock. He lay back on the bed with the paper, after again locking the door, and turned on the small reading light.
“Another one of those conferences,” he said after a glance at the headline. “Truman, Churchill and Stalin. At Potsdam this time. Let’s hope something good comes of it. This war has been going on much too long!”
Paul favored him with a curious, sidelong scrutiny. He parted his lips to speak and then stopped himself. Conklin’s feelings toward him at the present time were neutral; he said so, and he believed so. There was little point in causing that neutrality to develop into an active dislike or open hatred, through mistakes on his part. To speak his mind now would be a mistake. To speak either of their minds! The information in the paper wasn’t news to Conklin; he had known before leaving Washington that the president was away on another mission, had known most of the advance details. The headline only served to remind him of the facts he already knew. Paul seized that knowledge from him while he was reading the headline and the subheads above the body of the story. And, he noted now, Conklin didn’t bother to follow down the page, didn’t read the news story itself.
Instead, he asked, “Can I have the sports?”
Conklin pulled the section from the paper and flipped it across the room to him. Paul snapped on a second light and fingered through the pages. With an effort, he prevented himself from looking up at the F.B.I. agent.
“All right, dammit,” Palmer said, leaning over the edge of the bed, “if we’re going to stay awake all night I might as well join you.” He snapped his fingers at Conklin. “Give me the comics.”
Conklin seemed surprised to find him awake.
They went to the dining car for breakfast together. Paul had been the first to awaken, pulled from his sleep by the now-absent reveille which continued to dominate his habits. He tarried a moment on the edge of the bed, studying the two sleeping agents, and then he felt through his bag for the shaving equipment. The sound of running water awoke Conklin. Paul did not turn from the mirror or speak; he knew the man was lying on the bed watching him, speculating anew, and to greet him without first turning to see him awake would be another mistake. He wanted to avoid mistakes with Conklin at all costs; Conklin at least was a neutral friend, while the older Palmer was not. He had already lost Palmer, lost him yesterday afternoon in the office.
Stinging lesson: keep silent.
Conklin rolled out of bed and said good morning, and then he reached up to wake Palmer. Paul glanced listlessly through last night’s paper while they shaved and dressed. And the three of them went to breakfast.
“What would you like?” Conklin asked him. “Hungry? Order anything you want, anything at all.”
“I don’t have much money on me.”
“You don’t need it. I’m paying the bills.” He humorously nudged Palmer in the ribs. “Even yours.”
“You can afford it,” Palmer returned sourly. “You’ve got the prize.”
Paul saw no more than the sharp, warning look Conklin gave the other agent, but he caught the wince in Palmer’s mind as Conklin kicked him under the table. He ignored both of them and ordered a meal.
As he was eating he found himself absently listening, listening to both the words and thoughts of those about him in the car. That too was a habit, one that had caused him some faint shame when he discovered himself first doing it, because he felt as though he were prying into places where he didn’t belong. The shame wore away when he realized that he could no more shut out those stray wisps of thought than he could block off the spoken sounds reaching his ears. Sound could be closed out if he put his fingers to his ears, but the thoughts could not. And so it had become a detached thing; a mixture of thought and voice picked up from nowhere as he was working, drilling, loafing, reading. He would come out of some introspection to find the man next to him speaking or thinking, he would hear a few words or sentences or trains of thought, and then the pattern would be broken off as he moved on to something else.
Now, at the breakfast table, Palmer was poking a fork among the eggs on his plate and wondering aloud if they were fresh. To himself, he was saying that no one could fry eggs the way his wife did, and the prices on dining cars were terrible. Conklin was absently eating and looking out of the window. His thoughts were a continuation of the feverish planning of the night before, but his only words were a remark on the coming heat of the day and a superfluous reminder that Washington in July was intolerable.
Paul let his gaze drift about the diner.
A very pretty young woman caught his attention, a woman smartly dressed and made up, and he saw that most of the other men in the car were likewise enjoying her beauty. An older man sat beside her, a man he at first supposed to be her father until he caught the random, casual thoughts of both. Both in their way we
re thinking of the night just past. He was not her father. Paul hesitated only a moment longer, staring at the girl with surprise until she happened to glance up and catch his eye. In her mind she instantly replaced the older man with Paul, and Paul let his gaze slide past her. He was facing the greater length of the car with only a few of the corner tables at his back. A man and his wife were going to Washington to see . . . to see what? The president. They were going to see the president because their oldest son was in a prisoner-of-war camp and now their youngest son had received his draft notice. (But didn’t they know he was now in Potsdam?) Two salesmen were comparing routes and goods; one sold books, the other a line of meats. Books was complaining that the other had it lucky—people always ate. Line of meats countered that he had to pay three dollars to read a snappy one, whereas the other got to read them all free. Books closed that subject by declaring he had never read a book in his life, he only sold them. But his mind admitted it was a boastful lie—he did read them whenever he stopped overnight in a town lacking a decent picture or a burlesque theater. A heavy-set and scowling man sat alone at a far table, dividing his attention between the pretty girl and the trio at Paul’s table. The unpleasant fellow seemed vaguely reminiscent of one or two overbearing army sergeants Paul had known, and he stared at Paul and at his uniform with some distaste. In the next moment Paul discovered why. The man had been a sergeant, had only recently doffed his uniform and the mere sight of another caused a welling resentment in his mind. Paul could easily understand that and even sympathize with the view; he had yet to meet a man in the ranks who liked it, who wasn’t eagerly looking forward to his own day of separation. The former noncom let his eyes and wishes roam over the figure of the girl, and then he turned once more to Paul and the two cops.
Cops! With a start, Paul stared at Conklin.
Conklin asked, “What’s the matter?”
“He knows you’re policemen; both of you.”
Conklin frowned across the table, searching Paul’s face, but he did not turn to inspect the car. Palmer began a turning motion in his chair, but stopped himself before the movement could be noticed. “Who does?” he demanded.
“That fellow sitting down there—looks like he’s mad at the world.” Paul inclined his head toward the other end of the diner. “He’s an ex-sergeant; just got out, I think.” Conklin was watching Paul closely and with growing fascination. “How does he know?”
Paul didn’t answer for several seconds, and then, “I don’t know—really. He just seemed to recognize the two of you by looking at you. Not you, but what you are. He’s been around you before—he’s familiar with security agents. He recognized you from past association with others.” Paul stopped again, then smiled. “He thinks you’ve arrested me.”
“Why does he think that?”
“Just suspicion—suspicion of the two of you. He doesn’t know why I’m ‘arrested’; he just thinks that.”
Conklin nodded with an inner satisfaction that wasn’t lost on Paul. “Describe him, please.”
Paul did so, taking care not to let the ex-sergeant catch him staring. Palmer then asked which table he occupied and Paul told him.
“Is he looking this way now?”
“No, sir.”
Palmer casually turned and called the waiter. After a moment he said, “I don’t know him.” The waiter stopped by their table and received a request for more coffee. As he left, Conklin looked after him.
“Nor I,” he said a moment later. He faced Paul. “What’s he doing now?”
“Ogling that good-looking girl across the aisle.”
“No change in his suspicions?”
“No, sir”
Conklin returned to his meal. “Odd.”
“He’s probably been working around you fellows,” Palmer suggested. “You’ve been in his hair.”
“I suppose so.”
The elderly couple on their way to Washington got up from the table and left the car. Paul silently wished them luck, knowing all the time how futile their trip was. The two salesmen argued on and on while their waiter stood by patiently, waiting to clear the table. The girl and the man who was not her father were getting off at Harpers Ferry, where he had a hunting lodge up in the mountains. She had only two weeks vacation, but was expecting to stretch that into three or four. Occasionally her eye would light on one or another of the various men in the car, and briefly she would wish that man were going to the lodge with her. Four government clerks entered the diner all talking at once, and the former sergeant fell to watching them.
Paul said, “What’s—” and then stopped himself.
Conklin turned from the window. “Yes?”
“Not now, sir. Too many people around.”
“All right. I’m finished. Shall we go back?”
“Yes, sir.” He pushed back his chair and stood up, conscious that several eyes were on his uniform and that the heavy-set man at the far end of the car was studying them again. He walked out without looking back.
In their bedroom, he sat down and watched Conklin lock the door. That had become a ritual.
Palmer took off his coat and hung it up, revealing a shoulder holster which he now shifted to a more comfortable position. Paul glanced at the holster and said nothing. Last night Palmer had slept with his gun under his pillow, while Conklin had hung his over a hanger with his coat.
Conklin said, “Want anything?”
“No, sir.” He inspected the passing scenery and then turned back to the C.I.C. agent. “Well—yes, sir. Do you suppose I can have my civvies when we get to Washington?”
“I can’t promise that, but I see no reason why not. I’ll request them.”
“I’d appreciate that. I don’t suppose I’m out of the army?”
“I doubt it. But perhaps you would be more comfortable without the uniform.”
“Thanks.”
“You started to ask something in the diner,” Conklin reminded him. “Something you didn’t want to mention in a crowd.”
Paul nodded. “What’s an atomic bomb?”
He had his answer instantly, if it was an answer, but he waited for Conklin to speak. Conklin hesitated, turning the phrase over in his mind.
“I don’t honestly know. Where did you pick that up?”
“The sergeant back there.”
“An atomic bomb . . . I’ve never heard of it. But the name itself certainly suggests a frightful train of thought. I rather imagine it to be some new weapon the laboratory people have produced. But an atomic bomb!” Conklin reverted to his old pose of the tipped fingers beneath his chin. “And that man was thinking about it? Did he know what it was?”
“No, sir. Not what it was, but he knew about it.” Paul glanced absently at the closed door as someone passed by outside. “I thought you might know; that’s why I asked.”
“I don’t,” Conklin shook his head in puzzlement. “But I should like to. My imagination is worrying me.”
“I told you!” Palmer broke in. “The sergeant has been working around you fellows somewhere.”
The train paused briefly at Harpers Ferry, and Conklin gave the porter a telegram to file for him. Far down the platform Paul could see the young lady and her gentleman friend among the small crowd of people leaving the train.
A car was waiting for them at Washington’s Union Station. Paul twisted around in the seat to stare at the Capitol building. The first view of it coming out of the station doorway had been a breathtaking surprise.
To Be Continued
FOREWORD
The year is 1953. Secure in a fortress-like mansion in the heart of Maryland, Paul Breen faces the gun of his executioner. The long trail is about to end. No hidden microphones will relay the sound of the shot—no-one will interrupt the final scene.
“There is nothing I can say?” he asks quietly.
“Nothing. It is decided.” The finger tightened on the trigger. The barrel of the gun flipped in a quick arc and exploded into flame.
Paul Br
een first became aware of his peculiar talent in 1934 when, as a boy of thirteen, he saved enough money to take him to the Century of Progress Exposition in Chicago. Wandering the streets, lost in admiration at the polyglot city life, he witnesses a man shot down. Automatically he knows the man is a Government agent from Washington. He runs away from the scene of the crime, but later that night pieces together facts he knows are true—two men concealed in a second-floor window had shot Mr. Bixby. Although he had not seen them, he knew they were there. The G-man hadn’t told him his name, but he knew it was Bixby, and the name of the man who had actually fired the shot was Tony Bloch.
Using notepaper from the Exposition Paul writes a letter to the President and tells him the killer’s name, signing himself with Bixby’s secret code number.
From 1934 to 1941 Paul’s latent telepathic talent slowly grows. He realises what it is and that he is different to other people, so conceals his ability to read minds, thus keeping out of unnecessary trouble. At this time he realises that as a boy in Chicago he had sent the letter concerning Bixby to the wrong address, and naively writes the Federal Bureau of Investigation pointing out his error of seven years previous. This reaches a Bureau official named Palmer who has been assigned the task of finding the letter writer of 1934 who caused in apprehension of Bixby’s killers, but Palmer fails to uncover Breen.
Paul is eventually inducted into the Army in 1945 and later that year the one thing Palmer had been waiting for happened—Breen’s induction papers showed that his fingerprints matched those of the two mysterious letters. Palmer and a CIC operator named Peter Conklin interrogate him at Camp where he admits to being a telepath, telling them intimate details about their private lives. They decide to take him to Washington, where Conklin envisages Breen being able to pick out spies and traitors and Breen himself feels he will be able to help the Government in a super undercover manner.
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