The Program

by Stephen White

“Was it your MS?”

  “I think so. That and being out of shape.”

  He said, “I’m sorry.”

  She gave him a “that’s life” look, warning him she wasn’t in the mood to feel disabled.

  He told her about the call he’d received from Teri Grady.

  “That’s great. You’re going to do it, aren’t you?” was her immediate response to hearing the details of Teri’s offer.

  “I think so,” he said.

  “You don’t sound too certain. Why wouldn’t you do it? If I had the opportunity for that kind of variety in my work, I’d do it in a second.”

  “You would? Despite the fact that your new clients would be … I don’t know … criminals?”

  “My clients are criminals. I’m a prosecutor.”

  “You represent the people, not the criminals, and you know what I mean. You don’t have to advocate for the people you prosecute.”

  “I don’t care. It sounds like a fascinating opportunity. I think you should do it. It will help take your mind off the baby.”

  “I don’t want to take my mind off the baby.”

  “Good dinner,” she said, ignoring his protest. “Anyway, you know you’re going to do it. You’re just playing reluctant so I’ll feel good that you included me in your decision.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “Alan.”

  “Well, not totally,” he said.

  2

  Alan’s part of the security-clearance process involved participating in a rather detailed interview with an FBI agent named Flaherty, whom Alan suspected—based solely on linguistic clues—was from somewhere in the Northeast. The remainder of the screening process would apparently involve the FBI doing whatever it was the FBI typically did behind the scenes, including talking with references that Alan had provided. He’d given them the name of a friend, Sam Purdy, who was a Boulder police detective, and the names and numbers of three ex–FBI agents whom he’d worked with over the past couple of years. It turned out that Flaherty had taken a course at the FBI Academy on computer-assisted crime from one of the retired agents on Alan’s reference list, a man named Kimber Lister.

  Alan considered that propitious.

  • • •

  THE FOLLOWING FRIDAY morning he pulled his car into the garage of an imposing granite building on Cherry Creek South Drive in Denver and took the elevator to the fourth-floor office of Teri Grady, M.D. The man who greeted him in Teri’s comfortable waiting room was wearing ankle-length biking Lycra and a Gore-Tex windbreaker. He said, “Dr. Gregory? I’m Inspector Ronald Kriciak—I’m a field inspector with the U.S. Marshals Service. Welcome aboard. Thanks for being willing to help.”

  “It’s a pleasure to meet you.” Alan perused the marshal’s bicycle garb. “You’ve been riding already today?”

  Kriciak fingered his lightweight jacket. “Not yet. I’m on my way right after we’re done here.”

  “Where are you heading?”

  “Not sure. Some canyon work probably. I want to do some climbing. You ride, too.” It wasn’t a question.

  “Whenever I can.”

  Kriciak pointed to the open doorway. “We have a little while before we get started with Teri. I asked you to meet me a little early because I brought some material for you to read. You okay with that? I can’t leave it with you. Security.”

  “Sure.”

  Kriciak handed across two files, and Alan began reading about his two new patients. Kriciak picked up a copy of People.

  ALMOST THIRTY MINUTES later, the two men entered Teri’s consultation office, which Alan could tell was at least twice the size of his own. Two huge windows faced the mountains. An old Persian rug graced a hardwood floor that definitely wasn’t made of oak. Alan guessed cherry or a darkly stained maple. Teri sat, or more accurately, reclined, on a sofa that was flanked by two identical upholstered chairs. Kriciak took one. Alan shook Teri’s outstretched hand and lowered himself onto the other chair.

  “Teri, how’s your…?” He stumbled, not wanting to say “spotting” in front of Kriciak.

  She forced a smile. “Let’s just say this may be the last time I see this office for a couple of months.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry. Bed rest?”

  She shrugged. “My OB would scream if he knew I was here. But screaming OBs are the least of my worries. How’s your wife doing?”

  “Lauren seems invigorated by the pregnancy so far. She got pretty tired during the first trimester, but since then it’s been great. She started doing yoga last week, too. Seems to like it.”

  Kriciak cleared his throat and tapped his watch, an electronic thing that to Alan’s eye appeared to have sufficient circuitry to track incoming ICBMs should NORAD develop any serious malfunctions. Teri said, “Sorry, Ron. I know you want to get going.” To Alan she explained, “Ron’s a bachelor and is currently pretending to be uninterested in the miracle of procreation.”

  “Ah.”

  She continued, “As I’m sure he’s already explained, Ron’s one of the field inspectors who’s assigned to WITSEC in this region. He’s been my contact for work with the patient of mine you’ll be continuing with, and he’ll be the contact for the new patient of yours who’s being processed into the program right now. She’ll arrive when? Tuesday, Ron?”

  “Something like that.”

  I could tell from Teri’s face that she’d noted that her question hadn’t been answered. She didn’t challenge Kriciak about it. Instead, she said, “Why don’t you explain your role to Alan.”

  Kriciak was one of those men who sat with his legs as far apart as the chair permitted. There must have been two and a half feet of separation between his knees. He’d be hell as a companion at a theater or on an airplane. He said, “Number one, as the field inspector, I’m their monitor from the program. Number two, I’m their lifeline, at least initially. Once they arrive in their new home I help them get organized, settled, teach them what I have to teach them about establishing and maintaining their new identity, about maintaining security, about the region, the program rules, what we can do for them, what we can’t do for them. The longer someone’s in the program, if they’re working out, the less I hear from them, and the less they see me.” He smiled at Teri. “Your guy Carl’s an exception to that rule. The more he’s in the program, the more he figures out ways he thinks I can be of help. I swear he’d redesign the whole damn program if somebody offered him the chance.”

  Alan thought he detected a vein of criticism in Ron Kriciak’s characterization of his what? Client? Charge?

  Ron faced Alan and continued. “I’ll be doing the same thing for you that I’m doing for Teri. Dr. Grady. When she needs things, she calls me. I see what’s possible and whether the program can be of help. The truth is that more often than not, we can’t help. You’ll do the same. Here are my numbers.” He handed Alan an embossed business card. “Pager or cell tends to be the best way to find me most of the time.”

  “Teri?” Alan said. “I’m not sure I understand. Why, during the course of psychotherapy, would I need to consult a marshal for assistance with my patient?”

  Teri adjusted a pillow that supported her knees. She winced as her baby jabbed an elbow or a heel into some organ where she didn’t really want it. “The work I’ve been doing with Carl in therapy isn’t exactly psychoanalysis, Alan. Don’t misunderstand—he’s insightful enough, but the work’s more … practical. Think action more than insight. I do a lot of education, guidance, even advice. Teaching, too. And when it turns out that Carl needs something specific, something concrete, that you think is prescriptive—potentially therapeutic—you need to negotiate it with Ron. Everything Carl wants to do that stretches the envelope, he needs permission from the program. And for him that starts with Ron.”

  “Yeah, I’m like a deputy god,” Ron said with only a hint of a smile. “But Teri’s got a point. Carl does like to stretch the envelope.” Alan noticed him fingering his fancy watch and wondered if he’d pushed a bu
tton to time the meeting.

  “What else do I need to know, Ron?”

  “About Carl? Not much. You read his background. Teri knows him as well as I do, maybe better. She’ll fill you in. What I need you to understand about Carl is that he’s truly hot.” Ron leaned forward and filled half the distance between his chair and Alan’s. “He’s not some low-level wiseguy grunt who’s in the program because he’s got delusions of grandeur or some unrestrained paranoia that a bunch of over-the-hill capos are out to get him. Carl is the real thing. If the right people found out who Carl really is and where Carl actually is, Carl would be a dead man. Do you understand?”

  Alan nodded. Swallowed. “I understand. What about my other new patient?”

  Ron looked briefly at Teri. “Peyton. Her program name is Peyton Francis. You watch the news, read the newspapers? If you do, then you already knew most of what you saw in Miss Francis’s jacket.”

  Teri’s face accurately reflected how perplexed she was at Ron’s comment. She hadn’t seen the file Alan had read in her waiting room. She said, “The name Peyton Francis doesn’t sound familiar to me.”

  Ron said, “That pretty prosecutor down in New Orleans? The one who was threatened by that drug guy in court? Remember that story? Her husband was later gunned down in the French Quarter while the two of them were waiting to have lunch to celebrate their anniversary? Am I ringing any bells yet?”

  “Yes,” she said, remembering. A few months back, the story had been big news.

  Alan’s wife, Lauren, who was also a prosecutor, had been captivated by the whole saga. Alan recalled that Lauren had said the Louisiana prosecutor had been forced into hiding with her daughter. The feds and the local district attorney in Louisiana had argued publicly about which agency should protect her. Alan no longer had to guess how the dispute had been resolved.

  Kriciak said, “Her name then was Kirsten Lord. Now it’s Peyton Francis. Anyway, she’s Alan’s other new WITSEC patient. I’ve been told she’s anxious and depressed. Can’t imagine why.” Alan wondered if he was detecting some smugness in Ron’s tone.

  Alan said, “Given what I remember about her story, I find it hard to believe she’s in Witness Protection.”

  Ron actually smiled this time. “What goes around, comes around.”

  “Wasn’t she—I don’t know a better way to put it—a harsh critic of the way you guys manage the program? Didn’t she testify in Congress about the number of violent crimes that have been committed by protected witnesses?”

  “She’s the one,” Ron admitted. “The guy who threatened her in court? Same one who probably ordered the hit on her husband? He was once one of ours. No longer, of course. Now he’s doing two consecutive life sentences after she convicted him for a series of rapes.”

  “And now you’re protecting her from him? I find this incredibly ironic.”

  Kriciak closed his eyes for an instant longer than a blink, still fighting to hide that smile. He shrugged and said, “Small world.”

  Alan said, “I assume it was her idea. Entering the program.”

  “That’s a fair assumption. We certainly had nothing to hold over her as leverage to force her to come in. My guess is that she recognized that her choices were limited because the stakes are so high. The danger she’s in is severe. No one’s better at protecting witnesses than we are.”

  “She’s a witness? She knows who killed her husband?”

  “Not exactly. She’s a special admit to the program. She’s being protected as a threatened prosecutor.”

  He chanced a glance toward Teri. Her expression was neutral; she wasn’t sending him signals to alter his line of questioning. He asked Ron, “Isn’t her being in the program difficult for the people in the Marshals Service? It puts you in the position of having to protect someone who’s been publicly critical of your work.”

  Ron touched his chest. “Hey, am I the one in therapy here?” He leaned forward toward Alan again. “Listen, Doctor. Can I call you Alan? Good. Alan. In Witness Security I don’t get to work with too many saints. Some mob informants. More and more drug informants, people who’ve been turned by the DEA. But mostly people who have broken more laws than most civilians know exist. People who have killed people. People who have sold enough crack or heroin to fill my garage to overflowing. I don’t think about whether I like these people or not. I wouldn’t get very far worrying about what’s difficult for me personally. You know what I’m saying? Peyton Francis and I will get along because we need to. It’s that simple.”

  “She’s coming into Colorado when?”

  “It’s not important for you to know when she arrives. You’ll meet her next week. She’s asked for an early appointment to see a shrink. What can you offer me, time-wise?” He yanked a Palm Pilot from an ass-pack that was on the floor by his chair and poked at the screen with the stylus.

  Alan knew his open hours without having to consult a calendar. “I can do Monday at nine-thirty, Wednesday at one-fifteen, Thursday at ten.”

  “She’ll take next Thursday at ten for the first meeting. After that you can work it out with her.” He pecked away at the little computer for another ten seconds. “Your bills will come to me at the address on the card. What else? Teri, anything I’m forgetting?”

  Alan thought that Teri was concentrating much more on her womb than on Ron Kriciak’s questions. She shook her head.

  “Well then, I think I’ll be going.” He stood and replaced the Palm Pilot in his pack.

  Alan pointed at his riding gear. “So, what do you ride, Ron?”

  Kriciak narrowed his eyes and said, “A bicycle.”

  AFTER THE MARSHAL left, Teri Grady said, “The amount of attitude fluctuates. I don’t have my finger on it, yet. I think it’s a product of his ambivalence about these people he works with. Before I was visibly pregnant, I got less of it. Now that he’s not so eager to flirt with me, it leaks out a little bit more. I imagine you’ll get a healthy dose.”

  “But he’s helpful when you need something?”

  “Helpful? I don’t know about that. He listens, doesn’t sabotage overtly, has a reasonably open mind. But he works for a secret government program that isn’t eager to explain itself to me or anybody else. We get along. I don’t waste energy trying to diagnose him; he’s not my patient.”

  “But Carl is,” Alan said.

  “Yes, Carl is,” Teri said. “Carl Luppo. I like him, by the way. Based on what I know about him, I would estimate he’s killed somewhere between fifteen and twenty people. And that could be an underestimate. I’ve never asked for an accurate accounting.” She puffed out her cheeks and opened her eyes wide in disbelief. “And despite knowing all that, … I like him.”

  Alan guessed what Teri was saying. He translated. “Transference is amazing stuff. So is countertransference.”

  “Tell me about it,” she said.

  3

  THURSDAY AT TEN

  Peyton Francis was early for her first appointment with Dr. Gregory. Ron Kriciak had dropped her off out front of the small house that contained his office at least twenty minutes early. She found her way into the waiting room ten minutes before the hour, and Dr. Gregory walked into the room to retrieve her exactly on time.

  DR. GREGORY USUALLY spoke first during initial therapy sessions, and he usually used the same phrase to do it. “How can I be of help?” is what he’d say.

  But Peyton preempted him. As soon as she sat down, she said, “I really need this. Thanks for seeing me so soon. You should know that I was hoping you would be a woman. They originally told me that I’d be seeing a woman.”

  Dr. Gregory gave her time to continue. She didn’t. He said, “You’re disappointed?”

  “Yes. But I’ll manage. I haven’t gotten too much of what I wanted lately. Do you know what’s happened to me? Have the marshals filled you in? As you can probably tell, I don’t have much experience with all this. Psychotherapy, I mean. Up until now I considered myself one of the fortunate people, not one of
the troubled ones.”

  “I know the public story and also some details that Inspector Kriciak chose to share with me. That’s all I know.”

  “So you know about Robert? My husband? You know what they … um, did to him in New Orleans?”

  “Yes.”

  She picked a thread off her dress and spun it into a ball between her index finger and thumb. “That day? At times it feels like I wasn’t actually there, but I was. I was right next to him, a few feet from him. But in my head I still see it as though I was far away, like down the street from him, separated by a glass wall. No matter how much I wanted to, I couldn’t get to him. Do you know what I mean?”

  Dr. Gregory didn’t and said so with his eyes and with a slow shake of his head.

  He watched as his new patient pressed her lips together and narrowed her eyes. Her knees were locked tight in front of her, as though they’d been fused.

  “It’s like, when I looked up and saw the two of them,… I knew the danger he was in—even though all I saw is a man with a coat over his arm at a funny angle—but I felt in my gut that something was terribly wrong. It was the same way I can tell when my daughter has strep, or how I know when she’s been hurt by something a friend has said to her. I just know. That day, I just knew.”

  Gregory watched her pause and exhale without inhaling first. The mention of her daughter, is what he thought.

  “Landon is my daughter. That’s not her real name. She’s nine, now. Just nine.” Peyton looked up and met her therapist’s eyes, hoping for some sign of understanding from him. “It’s like that,” she said.

  He digested her words, saw the fork she’d presented in the road, and picked one route. His choice was reluctant. That was nothing new for him when he did therapy. He said, “It’s like a dream that feels real?”

  She thought about his analogy and apparently decided that she could live with it. “Sure. Okay,” she said as though the last thing she wanted to be was disagreeable. She rubbed her hands together. “Is it cold in here, or is it me?”