Assignment - Treason

by Edward S. Aarons

  “Hackett will be back,” Jones said quietly. His eyes were fixed on the wall above Durell’s head. “I wish you wouldn’t try so damned hard to antagonize him. It won’t buy you anything."

  "What does Q have on you?”

  “Nothing, thank God,” Jones said quietly.

  “Then why carry Hackett on your back?”

  “Orders from upstairs. Quenton swings a big stick everywhere. He offers the staff a trained investigator like Hackett, checked out in every direction, and we have to accept him. Otherwise the papers scream, people get in trouble in mysterious ways, I’m out of a job, and when I look for another it’s too bad, tough luck, no jobs available. So I tolerate Hackett.”

  “How long has it been going on?”

  “Too long. I’m waiting for the real press to get the poop on it. Maybe it will end then. Until that time, I don’t like it, you don’t like it, nobody likes it. Quenton has himself a ball. Real patriot, our Texan. Rubs our noses in Texas dirt, makes us eat it." Jones looked at his cigarette. “Were you snowing me about Hackett doing the clobber job on you?"

  “I don’t think so.”

  “But you‘re not sure, eh?”

  “No. I‘m not sure.”

  “I almost wish it was true. That’d be a lulu. A real bozoom of a bust. I might look into it, though. It might mean a sharp knife slitting my throat. I must be nuts, but I like you, Durell.”

  “Thanks.”

  “I don’t want any. Just don’t get Hackett sore anymore.”

  “Those Q men belong back in the Dark Ages,” Durell said. “How does Quenton really get away with it—aside from turning everybody’s innards green for fear they might get lapped with a subversive label by the almighty Quenton? Either you go along with Hereward, or you’re a Red and a radical and a traitor, eh?”

  “You’ve added two and two, brother.”

  “And where does Q keep his dirty files on our little government girls and top brass? That's where he twists the stick, right?"

  “He has nothing on me. I live a clean, honest-to-God American life,” Jones said, grinning a little.

  “But where is the scandal buried?”

  “Nobody knows,” Jones said tiredly. “Are you all through?”

  “I think Q stinks,” Durell said. “Now I’m through.”

  Jones said in a different voice, “Yes. You are."

  “Got enough on me to hang me?”

  “Twice over.”

  “Let me talk to Dickinson McFee.”

  “He’ll be here. Be patient.”

  “When?”

  “Soon.”

  “I’ll talk to him alone, or not at all.”

  “Sure.”

  “Not in this room, either.”

  “It’s not bugged," Jones said.

  “I don’t believe anything you say. I’m sorry, Jones. You knuckle under to Q, and I don’t think Quenton and his policy of fear ought to exist in our democracy. Quenton is taking a leaf out of the Nazi cookbook, and the brew he’s stirred up is a stench in the nostrils of every decent American—or it would he, if folks knew about the atmosphere he's created here in Washington.”

  “I guess there’s no use asking you what happened to the confidential file you stole."

  “I don’t have it,” Durell said.

  “But you admit you stole it?"

  “I admit nothing.”

  “But you know where it is?”

  “I'll talk to McFee.”

  Jones crushed out his cigarette and sat down behind the desk and stared at Durell with pale, disillusioned eyes.

  He knew what fear was like. His fear was a deep, dark thing that crawled all through him as it grew. He had risked death many times to perform the assignments given him in the past, and he had never felt like this before. The fear was a sickness almost like claustrophobia, an insidious choking sensation as if walls were closing in on him, leaning over him, starting to topple down to crush him. His mind went over and over the path on which McFee had started him. He had been careless, perhaps. He had relaxed just once, for the first time, because Corinne was Sidonie’s cousin and he was fond of Sidonie and Deirdre had been woven into it, somehow; and it was all a part of becoming attached to people, when you let them push and pull at you until you made one slip, let your guard down just once. Then you were through.

  He did not know what time it was when McFee came into the barren little room. He did not care. He stood up when Hackett opened the door and let the General enter.

  “Not here,” Durell said at once. “We won’t talk here.”

  “It’s all right, Sam,” McFee said.

  “How did Quenton get his gang of private snoops into a government affair? How do those buzzards get clearance, anyway? They act like tin gods, and I won’t—”

  “Relax, Sam.”

  “Get him out of here,” Durell said. “Jones, too.”

  McFee looked at Hackett and Jones. Jones nodded quickly and started for the door. Hackett hesitated. His face was sullen; but he was unsure of himself. McFee’s personality dominated him. He shrugged and went out.

  “Sit down, Sam. Quenton is in on this. God knows how,” McFee said wearily. “He’s into everything, it seems. It’s even worse than when he sat up on Capitol Hill and sabotaged everything and everybody from the White House on down in the name of the flag and the Lone Star State. I’ve been on the phone with him twice this morning. The Pentagon and Joint Chiefs, too. First time, I told Quenton to pull his cow hands off my range and keep them off. He didn’t take it very kindly. That’s when Joint Chiefs jumped me. Also two Senators. And State. And the White House, though damned if they seemed to like it. I had to be polite when Texas called the second time. Licked his nasty chops. He wants your head, Sam.”

  “Why?”

  “You tell me."

  They stared at each other in a moment’s silence. McFee looked bitterly tired. There were dark shadows under his eyes, deep lines incised at the corners of his mouth. His gray suit was rumpled. Yet he carried himself with military precision, and his cool eyes had lost none of their keen perception. It seemed to Durell that Dickinson McFee looked at him with a remote and bleak reserve behind his words, as if he, too, had moved a step backward, away from him.

  “How did Hereward Quenton know I had that file?” Durell asked.

  “How does Q know anything? Money talks, and with some people, the more money you have, the louder you can talk. Quenton is dedicated to preserving a loyal government. That’s his line. You can’t quarrel with it. He has six or seven Senators on key committees riding with him. Have you ever met the man?”

  “No.”

  “You're lucky, Sam. He’s done some good work—give the devil his due. The Jennings case, the Freeland business. His men are tough, hard, good. Most departments are glad to accept ‘em, especially when their salaries don’t come out of the budget. That’s one side of the coin.”

  “And the other?"

  “Crackpot stuff. Lunatic-fringe groups. Hate Everybody cliques. He heads ‘em all. No deals with the enemy, no peace conferences, let’s A-bomb and H-bomb ’em off the face of this earth.”

  Durell waited.

  “It’s dangerous,“ McFee said. “Always dangerous, with that much money, that much press. They call Quenton the Baron of East Texas. Bigoted, narrow, rich, mean. So—dangerous.”

  “To us?”

  “To all of us. You, me. Joe Corn in Iowa and Benny the Book on Times Square. All of us.”

  “Why don’t we do something?’

  “Not our job,” McFee said. “The FBI keeps tabs on that sort of thing. We don’t tread on their toes.” The General shrugged. His face was cast in iron. “You asked how Quenton got onto the missing file. Nobody was supposed to know about it until we put the arm on you this morning and found it in your possession, light? But Quenton knew. Only one answer to it. Somebody in K Section works for him, of course. I didn't think they had managed to infiltrate us. But they have. You must admit they work f
ast and sure. They know everything about you on the cover plan; but they don’t know, yet, about our private arrangement on this project."

  “They won’t learn about it from me,” Durell said.

  “All bets are off,” McFee said flatly. “You may tell them if you wish."

  “Will they believe me?"

  “No.”

  Durell said, “What do you mean, all bets are off?"

  “Give me the file you took, Sam.”

  Durell looked at him.

  McFee said, “Are the Q men right? Did you lose it?”

  “Yes.”

  “Who took it from you?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You were with Corinne Ybarra?”

  “Yes.”

  “Was she part of it?”

  “I don’t know."

  “Were you part of it, Sam?”

  The question came quietly, almost gently, but it was as if McFee had suddenly plunged a fist into his belly. Durell drew a deep breath, steadied himself, and met the General’s bleak. ice-water eyes.

  “Do you honestly think I’ve sold out?” Durell asked.

  “Do you think I’m playing a double game?"

  “I’m not thinking. I’m asking.”

  “You know me better than to ask. Your question implies doubt.”

  “Don’t be touchy, Sam. We’re sitting on dynamite. Both of us. I’m not worried about myself. I’ve been around Washington a long time, and I know how the rules run in my echelon levels. But you’re in trouble. It couldn’t be worse. Do you understand?“

  “No,” Durell said flatly. “I don’t.”

  “I can’t help you,” McFee said. “Not without that file. Give it to me, Sam. and then we can talk about what we can do."

  “I don't have it.”

  “Look here. You’re a good man, a careful man. You never slackened before, never left a chink in your armor. But tonight you let a fancy girl take you down the garden path to a mugging party. It doesn’t sound like you. It doesn’t ring true. Remember, I know you, Sam. Tough and suspicious and lonely. All right, you’re going to get married. Did that addle your brains? Did you go with Corinne Ybarra like a trusting child?”

  Durell said nothing. He had no answer. In some measure, what McFee said was true. Perhaps he had made a mistake in permitting Corinne to distract him for a vital moment. He had been perturbed about Deirdre, sick about the future. He had lowered his guard.

  “Tell me what happened, Sam," McFee urged.

  Durell told him. He made it brief and blunt, about Colonel Gibney, about the girl. the drive into Virginia, the chase and the manner in which he had been trapped. He watched McFee as he spoke, but the General’s face never told him anything. He felt sick. McFee did not believe him. It was McFee’s job to be suspicious, but he had not expected that suspicion ever to be directed against himself.

  He felt the gray ugliness of being alone and friendless.

  “Don’t you believe me?” he asked McFee.

  “It is not a question of believing or disbelieving. You had the file. I trusted you with it. You claim it’s lost. It was your ultimate insurance against anything going wrong with your assignment. If you return it to me, we can go ahead with our project. Without it, the loyalty board has full authority.”

  Durell’s mouth was dry. “They’ll railroad me. You know how they work.”

  "Yes, I know."

  “You’re supposed to help me escape after the trial."

  “That’s out now.”

  “So I sweat it out alone?”

  “In a federal penitentiary.”

  Durell stared in disbelief. “I can get the file back. I can

  get it back somehow.”

  “Through Corinne?”

  “Maybe.”

  McFee said harshly, “She works for Quenton. You won’t get it through her.”

  “Are you sure?"

  “I’m not sure about anything that concerns Q. But I think she’s the one. You’re grabbing at a straw. Maybe Quenton is framing you, Sam. I don’t know. Maybe you antagonized somebody over there.”

  “This is insane,” Durell whispered. “Where is Corinne now?”

  “She’s disappeared.”

  “Did you check Colonel Gibney? He’s soft on her.”

  “We’ve checked everything. She’s off the face of the earth, as far as we’re concerned. Maybe Quenton has her stashed away somewhere. Maybe she‘s off on her own little schemes. And maybe she’s dead.”

  It was quiet in the little room. It was almost dawn, and he saw by the pale light that touched the window that there was only a blank brick wall beyond, perhaps six feet away. He got up and looked outside. An alley was below, too far down to jump, opening to a street fifty feet to the left. Dimly, the sounds of early traffic came to him. The morning was no cooler than the day just past.

  He turned back to McFee, knowing he was pleading and making himself swallow his pride in order to plead. “I can find Corinne,” he said. “I’ll make her tell me the truth.”

  McFee shook his head. “You won’t get the chance. You’re under arrest. The loyalty board convenes at nine o’clock—four hours from now. It’s all cut and dried. Your cell is waiting for you.”

  “And the rest of my assignment?”

  “Canceled.”

  “I just go to jail?"

  “That’s the risk you took.”

  “You don’t help me out?”

  “I can’t—unless you still have the file.”

  Anger flared in him. “Are you afraid of Quenton, too? Is that it, General? Does he have you scared and running? Does he frighten you so much that he can make you let me down, too?”

  “I’m sorry,” McFee said.

  Durell sat down. He felt something change and harden and crystallize in him. He thought of many things: of the bayou country and his boyhood, of women he had known, of Deirdre and Lew Osbourn, of Sidonie and Corinne. They came to his mind in a ghostly parade, and as they appeared, he banished them, one by one, as if exorcising ghosts. He was alone. He did not need them or want them.

  “What is it, Sam?” McFee asked in an odd voice.

  Durell looked at him and did not reply.

  McFee waited for a long moment, and again his face was of iron, his eyes of ice. Then he turned and went out.

  chapter SIX

  NIGHTMARE.

  Six faceless men.

  He heard the voice of the accuser: cold, contemptuous, certain. It was a single voice, repeated again and again, briefly and concisely hammering down the lid on the life and career of S. Durell.

  The room was cool and official. There was no legend on the double-leafed door that led into it. There was a long polished table, scrupulously bare, and the row of identical chairs for the six identical faces of the members of this particular panel of the loyalty board. A male stenotypist sat with his back to the proceedings, near the heavy silken flags on their stands.

  Durell listened to the accusations with a sense of detachment. He was here, but he was not here. He felt apart from what was happening here, as if nothing he did and nothing he said could matter.

  “Mr. Durell, is it not a fact that you deposited twenty thousand dollars in the Capitol Bank and Trust Company yesterday, at approximately ten o’clock in the morning?”

  “Yes,” he said.

  “The deposit was in cash?”

  "Yes."

  “Tell this hoard where you obtained that amount of money.”

  “No,” he said.

  “You refuse to answer the question?”

  “I so refuse.”

  “On what grounds?”

  “I plead the Fifth Amendment,” he said.

  The faceless men stirred as if a cool wind had blown among them. The chairman’s voice grew more strident. “Did you obtain that money from gambling, Mr. Durell?”

  “I have nothing to say about it.”

  “Is it not a fact that the money was, indeed, payment to you for carrying out cert
ain espionage assignments detrimental to the welfare and safety of the United States of America?” Long, oratorical roll of voice, deep patriotic passion, anger rising out of justice and outrage. “Will you answer that question?”

  “No.”

  “You will not say if it is true or false?”

  “No.”

  “You are guilty of contempt, Mr. Durell. This board does not recognize any validity in the plea of self-incrimination contained in the Fifth Amendment, in this case.”

  Durell was silent.

  There was a huddling of the six faceless men. It was quite hot and momentarily still in the official room. Durell’s face ached. There was a dull pulse of pain over his eyes. He felt the weight of his outcast loneliness like the isolation of some dread quarantine. He felt the probe of coldly curious eyes in the white faces arrayed against him. He stirred restlessly. Despite all his previous mental adjustments, he sensed the blanket of guilt and shame that closed over him.

  Nightmare.

  McFee sat quietly, a small gray man of stone, his words like pebbles dropped into placid water, his eyes looking at and through the six faceless men. Question: “Did you find Durell a capable, trustworthy operative in your department, General?”

  “He satisfied all the tests. His past was thoroughly checked out. He was mentally and physically declared more than competent. He was brilliant.”

  Past tense, Durell thought.

  “You had no slightest reason to doubt this man’s loyalty?”

  “None.”

  “Do you doubt it now?”

  “Yes.”

  “Tell us why.”

  McFee spoke in a monotone. “We have reason to believe that he stole from confidential files not ordinarily accessible to him a series of dossiers on men who send us information from behind the Iron Curtain. These are invaluable men, whose data, you must understand, make up the basis for analysis and extrapolation of our opponents’ industrial and social techniques. War potential today encompasses the whole community of a nation, the entire fabric of industry and technology. The secret agent is invaluable, but our section is composed mainly of technicians and scientists whose primary job is to analyze, deduce, and forecast enemy potentials in statistical form. Intelligence today is the fourth arm of our defense, gentlemen. The secret spy with confidential photographs is necessary, of course, but equally necessary are the men who have the capacity to interpret the meaning of those photographs.”