The bitterness welled up in his throat like a lump of bile.
“Things may not be as bleak as they seem, Laddie.”
Bryce whirled. Just inside the bars of his cell, slowly materializing in the semidarkness, was the figure of Nathaniel Gorham.
“Gorham!”
The old man’s fingers flew to his lips. “Shhh! You keep bellering like a calf for its mother and you’ll have the whole prison awake.”
Bryce instantly dropped his voice to a whisper. “Where have you been?”
Gorham ignored that. “We must talk very quickly. Mannington will be returning very soon now and sending for you.”
“Mannington!” Bryce hissed. “Who is he anyway?”
“Mannington is what is known as the minister of internal affairs. The ISD comes totally under his jurisdiction. He is one of the three or four most powerful men in the Confederation of North American States.”
“Great!” Bryce said in despair. “What other little surprises have you got in store for me? What about Senator Hawkes? Is he here too?”
“Benjamin Hawkes is a minor official in the New England Confederation up in Boston.”
“And Sterling Jennings? I mean, who else is going to jump out at me?”
“Who’s Jennings?”
“Former secretary of defense. He was with Mannington the night they offered me the ratification chairmanship.”
“Oh, yes.” Gorham shrugged again. “I don’t know. He’s one of the officials in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Doesn’t really matter.”
Bryce sat back, digesting that.
“You’ve not asked about the most important one.”
“Who?”
Gorham looked at him steadily.
“Who?”
“Did nothing strike you as strange tonight when Mannington confronted you?”
Bryce was suddenly nodding, the memory coming back like a flash. “Yes. He called me by name, spoke as if…” He was staring at Gorham. “He did know me!”
“That’s right. Leslie and Paul Adams are here in this dimension. Elliot Mannington is here.” He paused, then finished softly. “And so is Bryce Sherwood.”
“That’s impossible!”
Gorham put up his hands. “Look, let’s not start that again. I’m afraid my little analogy with the railroad track and the switch has misled you. There are not parallel tracks, not two separate, coexisting dimensions. There’s not another Bryce Sherwood somewhere out there right now sailing off the coast of Cape Cod. It doesn’t work that way.”
“Then how?” Bryce started, his head swimming. “How can all of this be?”
Gorham sighed. “When you hit that wall of light, it was as if you had instantly been hurtled backwards in time to 1787, the point where the railroad switch was located. Then in another instant you hurtled forward again. You were on the same train, with the same people, only now it’s in an America that never had the Constitution.”
“So I’ve had a whole life here?” He rubbed his hand across his eyes. “Then why can’t I remember it?”
“Look,” Gorham said, with growing exasperation. “You were put here by direct decree of the Council of Founding Fathers. I’m sorry if every detail doesn’t happen to fit into some neat, logical compartment for you. But that’s the way things are. Get that through your head, because time is running out fast now.”
Bryce finally straightened. “Who was I—or am I, then?”
“You are Bryce Sherwood. As a boy you were brought to Boston by an uncle. That’s where you were raised. From there it’s much the same as what you know. You graduated from Harvard Law School. Benjamin Hawkes spotted you and hired you as an assistant. That’s how Mannington met you.”
He stopped, and Bryce felt his heart sink.
“For the past four years, you have been the special assistant to Elliot Mannington III, minister of internal affairs.”
“Special assistant? What does that mean?”
“You’re Mannington’s fair-haired boy. It’s a low-profile but high-responsibility position. He uses you for things he doesn’t fully trust anyone else to take.”
The implications of what Gorham was saying were exploding in his mind, and none of those implications were very cheering. “So here I am, special assistant to the minister of internal affairs, caught conspiring with a group of resistance fighters? No wonder he said what he did tonight.”
“Are you?” Gorham asked sharply.
“Am I what?”
“Conspiring with the resistance movement?”
“No,” Bryce retorted bitterly. “Actually, I’m in here for loitering.”
The sarcasm had no effect on the old man. “There in the meeting tonight, you asked the American agent what you could do to help them. Did you really mean it?”
Bryce was suddenly angry. “If you knew I was there, why didn’t you appear then, warn us about the police? What does it matter now what I said?”
“It matters very much. Did you mean it?”
Bryce took a deep breath, meeting the probing gaze. “Yes.”
“I didn’t appear earlier because I was not allowed to. That meeting was a test to see if you had really changed.” He stopped, and a smile stole across his face. “Now you’ve passed the second one as well.”
“What second one?”
His eyes were gleaming. “Do you realize that you haven’t demanded that I take you back to the other dimension tonight. Not once. Do you realize that?”
That rocked Bryce back. “I…I guess I assumed it isn’t possible.”
“No. It’s because you’ve forgotten yourself. For the first time, you’re wrapped up in something bigger than your own needs.” He straightened suddenly. “Because of this, the council has authorized me to help you.”
Bryce just stared at him. “How?” A sudden hope leaped up in him. “Can you get to Leslie and her father, help them get away?”
Gorham shook his head.
Bryce suddenly felt sick again. “Is it too late?”
“No. No action will be taken against Leslie’s family until after your meeting with Mannington tonight. They’re still safe.”
The relief that hit him was like a blast of fresh air in the cell. “Then what? What do we do?” he asked.
Gorham pulled at his lower lip. “Once, in a speech you wrote for Senator Hawkes, you quoted something from Winston Churchill. Do you remember?”
Bryce started to shake his head; then, in an instant, it flashed back into his mind. He nodded and began to quote softly: “‘We fight not for glory, not for riches, not for honor; we fight only and alone for freedom, which no good man surrenders, save with his life.’”
“It’s one thing to say that in a speech,” Gorham said slowly. “It’s something else again to say it when you’re facing a death sentence in a prison cell, right?”
Bryce nodded slowly, the chilling reality of the possibilities hitting him hard.
“I won’t fool with you, son. What I am about to suggest carries great risk. It could put you in the gravest danger.”
“Will it help Leslie and her family?”
“They too are in grave danger. You are now their only hope.”
“Is there hope?” Bryce burst out, almost pleading.
“There is always hope for those who dare.”
Bryce sighed.
“Well?” Gorham asked quietly.
“There are no guarantees, I assume.”
There was an almost imperceptible shake of the head. “I’m not a guardian angel. I can help, but only to a limited degree.”
“I guess your generation didn’t have any guarantees either, did they?”
Gorham considered that, then smiled faintly. “Only the guarantees that spring from faith in God and the knowledge that we gave ourselves to a righteous cause.”
Bryce suddenly straightened. “That’s good enough.”
Gorham was suddenly all business. “Good. Then listen carefully, for everything now depends on what happens
between you and Mannington.”
Chapter 23
The minister of internal affairs was sitting behind his massive desk, face impassive. He waited until the guard took the handcuffs off Bryce, then dismissed the man with a wave of his hand. Colonel Anthony Burkhart stood slightly behind Mannington, eyes alert. Bryce suspected that he was armed and that that was why they allowed him to be freed from his restraints.
“You know Burkhart,” Gorham had told him in the cell, “but not well. Don’t underestimate him. You don’t get to be head of ISD through being inept or stupid.”
Bryce waited until the door closed behind the guard, then swung around to face Burkhart. “You idiot!” he burst out.
His intent had been to startle, and he fully achieved his objective. Both men’s mouths dropped open in surprise. Bryce bore in, pressing the advantage. “Weren’t you monitoring the conversation? Didn’t you hear what they said?”
“Of course,” Burkhart said, still caught off guard, “but—”
“But nothing!” Bryce roared. “We were on the verge of setting up Paul Adams, setting him up once and for all. But more than that. You heard the American agent. He was ready to bring in the leader of every major resistance movement. Every one!” He threw up his hands and turned to Mannington in disgust. “And then in comes Colonel Burkhart with blazing sixguns.”
Burkhart’s eyes had narrowed dangerously now, and Bryce could see he had skated out onto thin ice. But he was committed now. Into the breach and damn the torpedos. He sighed wearily and dropped into a chair. “Did you really authorize this, Elliot?”
“Don’t call him Mr. Mannington,” Gorham had warned. “You are one of the inner circle. You must be natural. You must be confident.”
Confident? Bryce nearly hooted aloud at that. His heart was pounding so hard his ribs hurt.
Mannington was watching him steadily, the dark eyes hard to fathom. For a moment, Bryce was tempted to press, but he decided there was a fine line between playing his role properly and suicidal overconfidence.
“Well,” Mannington finally said, his voice low and almost conversational, “let’s suppose before I answer that question that you explain to Anthony and me how it is that you can leave for a short vacation, turn up at a motel where two ISD men are murdered, and—”
“Two?” Bryce cut in. He looked puzzled. “Wait a minute. You didn’t find the sergeant?”
“No we didn’t,” Burkhart sneered. “Do you know something we don’t?”
“But I told you where they were holding him. You didn’t get him?”
“Come on, Sherwood,” Burkhart snarled. “Stop playing coy with us. We haven’t heard one word from you for a month.”
“But…” He looked to Mannington for support. “Didn’t you get my report?”
“What report?” he said flatly.
Bryce sat back, stunned, or so he hoped it looked. “But—I don’t understand. I finally got clear and called in a full report on the fourth day. I told you exactly where they were holding the sergeant.” He shook his head. “But he’ll be gone by now. They were taking him to Boston, smuggling him aboard a freighter—”
“You’re lying!” Burkhart snapped. “We had no report from you.”
Bryce shot to his feet. “Look!” he cried hotly. “Don’t call me a liar! You’ve already blown this operation. Find out who took my report!”
Both men glared at each other until Mannington broke in. “Day and time?” he said to Bryce. “We can easily check.”
Bryce paused, wrinkling his brow. “Let’s see, I left here on Thursday, August thirtieth. So it would have been the second of September. Yes, the second. Somewhere around 2:30 A.M. I had to slip away while the others were asleep.”
Burkhart picked up the phone. “Get me Major Powers.” There was a pause, then, “Major. Check the logs for the second of September—”
“I could be a day off,” Bryce spoke up, “but I’m almost positive it was the second.”
“Start at midnight on the second and check twenty-four hours in either direction. We’re looking for a telephone contact from Mr. Sherwood.” Pause. “Yes. I’m in the minister’s office. Bring it immediately.”
Bryce held his breath. Now came the test of Gorham’s ingenuity. When he had outlined their strategy, Bryce had instantly protested. There had to be some kind of irrefutable evidence if the story was going to stand. Gorham had merely smiled. “I think I can handle that,” he had said. Now they would see, because if the Elliot Mannington of this dimension was as shrewd as the Elliot Mannington Bryce had previously known, there could not be even the tiniest flaw.
Mannington turned to Bryce as Burkhart hung up the phone. “While we’re waiting for the major to check, why don’t you start at the beginning and tell us exactly what is going on?”
Bryce took a deep breath. They had had only a few minutes to rehearse this, and this was where it would all be decided. He sat back down again, face thoughtful. “Well, as you know, you gave me a week off to go to Boston for a vacation with my uncle and his family. I had no plans other than lying in the sun and doing some sailing.”
He looked up into Mannington’s dark eyes. “I did know, of course, that recently you have been very concerned about the increasing penetration of CONAS by foreign agents from the United States.”
Mannington nodded. “Go on.”
And so Bryce launched. For the most part, it was built on the framework of what had actually happened. He changed only one or two details, embellished only enough to build his case.
His car had broken down. It was night, so he hiked back into town. Realizing he would have to wait until morning to get it fixed, he took a room at the Dew Drop Inn. At first, Jessie Lambert and her son seemed exactly what they appeared to be, operators of a small motel and cafe in a very small town. But later, unable to sleep, Bryce had gone to see if the proprietors might have some aspirin for a splitting headache. As he reached the office, he heard the soft murmur of voices. Curious, he stopped to listen and had been stunned to realize he was eavesdropping on a clandestine meeting of the local resistance group.
Realizing the seriousness of what he had stumbled upon, Bryce had tried to call ISD, but just as he got the operator on the line, the son came out into the hallway of the motel. Thus Bryce had gone into his stupidity act, giving a false number, acting as though the operator wasn’t making sense. When the boy didn’t leave, Bryce gave up. He would find another phone first thing in the morning and report to ISD what he had learned.
Mannington seemed content to listen, but Burkhart interrupted frequently, and often with deliberate rudeness. He challenged the story, demanded details, called for exact times and other corroborating information. The first attempt at crossexamination by Burkhart nearly unnerved Bryce, but the fact that 98 percent of his story really happened made it easier. And the further he went with the colonel unable to shake his story, the more confident he became.
“Evidently the telephone operator got suspicious and called ISD.” He turned to Burkhart and frowned. “I know part of ISD’s strategy is to terrorize and cow people into submission, but that captain…I’m sorry about what happened to him, but if he hadn’t been such a conceited, arrogant idiot, he’d still be alive today.”
“I’ll mention that to his family,” Burkhart said coldly.
“The next morning I had just gotten out of the shower,” Bryce continued, ignoring that. “The boy, this Neal Lambert, was still curious about me and was hanging around, so I was trying to act as natural as possible. Suddenly the captain and the sergeant burst onto the scene. Next thing I knew, I was pinned up against the wall with Captain Talbot’s pistol jammed into my ribs. At first I stalled, because we were in the room with the boy and his mother. That didn’t help the captain’s mood. Finally, he and the sergeant took me in my room. That’s when I tried to tell them who I was. I showed my ID.”
There was no need to try to enhance his emotions to make it more believable; the horror of that morning was
on him again. “The captain didn’t believe me, accused me of having false papers. When I demanded that they call you, the sergeant slugged me in the stomach. I guess I wasn’t completely without blame, because I really got angry then. I told them what I thought of their highhanded tactics.”
He took a deep breath. “That’s when something snapped in the captain.” Bryce proceeded quietly now, giving the precise details of what happened next—his coming within an ace of being shot by the captain, Neal Lambert bursting into the room, the blast from the rifle, the hurried flight to the mountains in the back of the pickup. As he talked, he watched both men closely. Burkhart was still skeptical but finding it harder and harder to cross him. Mannington seemed more and more impressed, or so Bryce desperately hoped.
“As I sat in the root cellar all that next day, waiting for the woman and her son to return, it finally hit me what kind of opportunity I had been handed. Suddenly, by an ironic twist of events, I had been thrust right into the heart of the resistance movement. I didn’t have to establish any validity with them. I had won that with the blast of that rifle in the motel room.”
He looked to Mannington. “We’ve been trying to penetrate the inner core of the resistance movement for years, with little success. That’s when I decided this offered us an opportunity that would not come again.”
Mannington just nodded, his expression inscrutable.
“We fled south. I looked for an opportunity to call in, but I didn’t dare risk exposure. Finally on the fourth night I got away long enough to call. In my report, I told you exactly what had happened and asked for your permission to continue the mission. There was to be a code word given in the 8:00 P.M. radio news broadcast every day for the next week if you wanted me to pull out. I listened. There was nothing, so I continued. I also told you in my report that the risk of making further calls was too great and that I wouldn’t report in again until I had something definite.”
Gerald N. Lund 4-In-1 Fiction eBook Bundle Page 104
