Margaret Truman's Experiment in Murder

by Margaret Truman

  It turned out to be a special night at the Oval Room. When they arrived, they were met at the door by Secret Service agents who had their names on a clipboard and who asked for picture IDs. Cindy’s purse was examined, and Tatum received a cursory pat down, far less intrusive than being felt up at airports.

  “What’s going on? Tatum asked.

  “A special guest,” an agent replied tersely.

  That special guest turned out to be presidential candidate George Mortinson, Tricia, and ranking members of the boards of the Washington Opera and the Washington Symphony and their spouses. True to form, Mortinson had chosen the Oval Room at the last minute, and the agents, as well as the restaurant’s management and staff, had to scurry to prepare. Secret Service agents had visited the restaurant late that afternoon and given it a thorough going over. Mortinson disliked that his appearances inconvenienced people but accepted it as a necessary evil.

  Tatum was glad that he’d worn a sport jacket that night.

  “How exciting,” Cindy said as they were seated at a table with crisp white linen and red leather armchairs. It was obvious from the way the room was set up that Mortinson and his party would be seated as far from other diners as possible.

  “Do you think he’d give me an autograph?” Cindy asked after they had ordered drinks.

  “Don’t you dare,” was Tatum’s response.

  “Why not? He wants every vote he can get. Anyway, you know I’m a fan and hope he wins in November.”

  Tatum shared her political views. The thought of Allan Swayze being returned for a second term was anathema to both of them.

  Cindy ordered what she usually did when there—which wasn’t often because of its prices—spice-salted free-range chicken. Tatum chose seared salmon. Salads for both. The bottle of white wine Tatum picked was uncorked and poured.

  “Here’s to you and your promotion,” Tatum said, touching the rim of his glass to hers.

  “Thank you, kind sir,” she said. “And here’s to your patient getting out of jail.”

  Tatum had told Cindy about Sheila’s unexpected freedom while she dressed for their evening out. She, of course, thought it was good news.

  “Yeah, it is,” he’d agreed, “but I’m afraid of what will happen to her now that she’s on her own.”

  Although he’d told Cindy every aspect of his theory about Sheila’s brainwashing at the Lightpath Clinic, she didn’t necessarily share his concerns. Manipulating someone to kill another person through mind control and hypnosis simply didn’t play for her. That was science fiction, the stuff of Hollywood’s imaginative screenwriters.

  “What could happen to her now that she’s free?” Cindy asked as their salads were served.

  “I don’t know,” was Tatum’s honest reply. “She’s an incredibly malleable individual, Cindy, which puts her at risk if she falls into the wrong hands.”

  He continued to express his fears until Cindy said, “Can we talk about something else?”

  “Sure,” Tatum said, taking her hand in his. “Sorry. I get consumed by something and—”

  The arrival of Mortinson and party brought all conversation in the room to a halt. Flanked by two agents, Mortinson led the way, stopping at tables to chat and to shake hands.

  “He’s so personable,” Cindy said to Tatum.

  “He’s a politician,” Tatum said.

  “So is Swayze, but can you imagine him glad-handing people the way Mortinson does?”

  Their table was situated away from the path Mortinson took, and Tatum sensed that Cindy was disappointed to not have been able to shake the candidate’s hand. Like most people in the restaurant, they found themselves constantly looking over at Mortinson’s table and trying to catch snippets of conversation. Over coffee and a shared brioche soufflé with maple and banana, Tatum mentioned that Mackensie Smith was a friend of the Mortinsons.

  “Think he’d mind if I used his name?”

  Before Tatum could respond, Cindy got up, adjusted her dress, and made her way across the room in Mortinson’s direction. An agent stopped her just short of the table. Cindy said something to him. He scowled, turned, and relayed a message to Mortinson, who stood, smiled, and extended his hand to Cindy. She’d taken the dessert menu with her and handed it to the candidate. He turned and said something to his wife, which resulted in her pulling something from a large envelope and handing it to him. Mortinson signed it, shook Cindy’s hand again, and she returned to Tatum carrying a signed 8-by-10 color photograph. She beamed.

  “A good day for you,” Tatum said. “A promotion and raise, and now an autographed picture.”

  “He’s so nice,” she said.

  “He seems to be,” Tatum replied.

  The Mortinson party was still there when Tatum and Cindy left. Tatum was staying the night at her apartment; he kept a basic set of clothes and toiletries there for such occasions. They were in pajamas and watching a taping of the House of Representatives on C-SPAN when Cindy said, “I could have killed him.”

  “Killed who?”

  “Mortinson. I could have pulled out a gun and shot him.”

  “They frisked us when we arrived, Cindy. They went through your purse.”

  “But I could have carried a concealed weapon under my dress.”

  “I guess so.”

  “People like him are so vulnerable no matter how much security there is.”

  “I’m glad you didn’t. Shoot him, that is.”

  They turned off the TV and got into bed.

  “Thanks for a wonderful evening,” she said, nuzzling his neck.

  “Glad you enjoyed it,” he said.

  After making love, they turned off the light, and Cindy quickly fell asleep.

  Tatum lay awake for a long time, two visions dominating his mind.

  There was the vision of Cindy pointing a gun at Mortinson and pulling the trigger.

  And there was the vision of Sheila Klaus behind the wheel of a white Buick and running down Mark Sedgwick. As concerned as he was about her, he was also keenly aware that she had, in fact, murdered someone.

  It was that final realization, and the visual that accompanied it, that stayed with him until sleep reluctantly came.

  CHAPTER

  26

  SAN FRANCISCO

  Iskander Itani’s fists flew so fast that they were a blur.

  He pummeled the light punching bag that Sheldon Borger had had installed in his basement gym while Borger, Peter Puhlman, and Jake Gibbons looked on.

  “He’s fast,” Gibbons said.

  “He certainly is,” agreed Borger.

  “What about the headaches?” Gibbons asked.

  “He hasn’t had one since he’s been staying here,” said Borger.

  “You still want me to sign him to a management contract?” Gibbons asked.

  “Yes,” Borger replied, knowing that it would be a worthless piece of paper from which Itani would never be able to benefit. “I want to keep him positive for the short time I have left with him.”

  Itani stopped assailing the bag.

  “You’re looking good,” Gibbons said in his gruff, raspy voice.

  “I feel good,” Itani said, toweling perspiration from his face and neck.

  “The doc here says that your headaches have been cured.”

  “I don’t like the word ‘cured,’” Borger said, “but they are under control, under Iskander’s control. Isn’t that right, Iskander?”

  The young man nodded. “I will take a shower,” he said.

  Borger and Puhlman watched Itani and Gibbons leave the gym and head upstairs.

  “How are the sessions going?” Puhlman asked.

  “Extremely well,” Borger said. “In all my years of practice, he’s the best subject I’ve ever seen.”

  What he said was true, although there had been many others whose ability to enter trance and to be controlled through hypnosis came close. Sheila Klaus topped that list.

  But there was a distinct difference betw
een Sheila and Itani.

  With Sheila it was necessary to enhance her second personality, Carla Rasmussen. As superb a hypnotic subject as Sheila was, she was not an individual who could easily be convinced to hurt another person. She wasn’t filled with the sort of anger that consumed Itani.

  But Carla, who’d emerged during Sheila’s difficult childhood to fight her battles and right the wrongs done to her, was naturally combative.

  Itani didn’t need a second personality. His rage and his feelings of deprivation and betrayal were all-consuming, very much at his core. Without the necessity of dealing with an emerging second personality, Borger was free to work directly with Iskander to build upon what was already present, a young man with a murderous rage festering inside.

  Borger excused himself and went to his study, where he’d lately been spending most of his time. He’d established a three-a-day schedule of sessions with Itani, some of which exhausted him. His subject harbored more inner rage than Borger had realized from their early times together, and on a few occasions he thought Itani might lash out at him physically. It hadn’t happened, but those incidents only further convinced Borger that once the Itani project was completed, he would sever his relationship with the CIA.

  He didn’t regret the path he’d chosen to take with the agency. He had proved to himself and to his benefactors that the human mind could be controlled with the right subjects and when guided by a skilled physician. It would be nice if his successes could be heralded to the world, but he knew that was impossible. Perhaps one day when history was written.

  He’d lived a rich, satisfying life. All you had to do was look at this magnificent home on Nob Hill, check out his fleet of expensive cars in the four-car garage, his wardrobe, homes in other places, and the beautiful women who’d shared his bed.

  He was also buoyed by knowing that his work would be put to good, positive use. So much of medicine and research was theoretical, with little or no practical application. What good was coming up with a breakthrough if it wasn’t applied? Although he wasn’t particularly political—he considered all politicians to be weak-kneed and concerned only with hanging on to their bases of power—he did care about his country. He’d watched it disintegrate into what he considered a third-world Socialist shell of its former self, a welfare state in which the drive to succeed had been thwarted by a succession of presidents and Congresses that stood idly by and let it happen. He’d originally viewed Allan Swayze as someone who would put the brakes on the decline and was bitterly disappointed with the current president’s inefficient bumbling. Still, this occupant of the White House was far better than George Mortinson. To Borger, Mortinson was the epitome of weakness, a handsome, glad-handing phony who would enable the continuing deterioration of what was once the world’s superpower.

  Something had to be done to stop him, and Sheldon Borger had proved that he was the one to do it.

  A knock at the door interrupted his reverie.

  “Come in.”

  Itani entered. He’d showered and dressed in stylish clothing Borger had purchased for him. The psychiatrist’s barber had come to the house and given the young Arab a flattering haircut. Elena had visited again and spent the night with Iskander, and Borger had given him money to send to his mother and brothers using a post office box as the return address. Everything had gone smoothly, although Borger knew that he had to be careful to not do anything that might upset the volatile young man.

  “Ready for a session?” Borger asked.

  “Yes,” Itani said, taking his usual chair across from Borger.

  Borger handed him the notebook that had been part of the initial session, its many pages now filled with Itani’s written rants against Jews, Israel, and the “Israel lover” and “Jew lover” George Mortinson.

  “Did you see in the paper today, Iskander, that Mortinson is calling for increased military aid to Israel?”

  “Bastard!”

  “Money to buy weapons to kill your people.”

  Itani’s fists clenched and his eyes opened wide.

  Borger had reached a point with Itani that he no longer needed to hold the gold coin up to him to induce trance. He simply pointed to it on the small table between them. Itani’s eyes rolled up into his head and he shuddered.

  “You’re in a nice place now, Iskander, a restful, peaceful place, with your family and your people, and with Elena.”

  Itani smiled.

  “I want you to go deeper and deeper into your pleasant trance state. That’s it, Iskander, deeper and deeper and deeper…”

  The session lasted twenty minutes. During it Borger handed Itani an unloaded Glock 9mm and instructed him to go to the window. He was told that if he saw anyone outside, he was to shoot that person. Itani did precisely as ordered, taking aim at a Hispanic gardener. He was then told to resume his seat and to hand Borger the weapon, which he also did.

  When he was brought out of his trance, he had no recollection of what had transpired despite Borger’s questioning of him.

  “I want to see my brothers,” Itani said. The request came out of the blue.

  “You will see them soon.”

  “I want them to come here,” Itani said.

  “That is not possible, Iskander. It would seriously interrupt the progress we’ve made with your headaches. Besides, Mr. Gibbons is ready to offer you a management contract as a fighter. We don’t want to do anything to get in the way, do we?”

  Itani glared at Borger.

  “Is something bothering you?” Borger asked.

  Itani shook his head and stood. He appeared to want to say something but left the room without another word.

  This brief confrontation concerned Borger. He’d been aware of a growing restlessness in Itani over the past few days, a belligerence that was disconcerting. As he sat and pondered the situation, he came to the conclusion that he’d peaked with his subject. Itani would never be more ready to carry out his assignment than he was at that moment.

  But that posed a potential problem. There was always the possibility that something, someone, would enter the picture and undo the delicate control that Borger had over his subject. Itani wanting to see his brothers was troublesome, and he’d recently expressed a desire to visit the gym where he’d worked.

  Borger made a decision.

  He placed a call to Washington and reached Colin Landow at his home.

  “I believe he’s ready,” Borger announced.

  “I’m always nervous when someone says that he ‘believes’ something is ready,” was Landow’s reply. “It is or it isn’t.”

  Borger masked his pique and said, “You mentioned eleven days, Colin. Why has that date been chosen?”

  “We know what his campaign schedule is,” Landow said.

  Which meant that they had someone inside the Mortinson campaign feeding them information.

  “He’s at his peak,” Borger said. “There’s always the possibility of losing him. I’ll have to keep reinforcing what I’ve accomplished, but I suggest that the schedule be moved up.”

  “That’s impossible.”

  “What travel arrangements have been made?” Borger asked.

  “I’m coming to San Francisco tomorrow. I’ll give you all the details when I see you.”

  “It’s my suggestion that he be moved to Washington in the next few days. He needs a change of scenery, Colin. We run a risk by keeping him here.”

  Borger gnashed his teeth as he heard Landow click off the connection. He’d grown to detest the man with his pinched speech and inflated sense of self. He had a fleeting vision of Itani killing not only George Mortinson but Colin Landow as well. It brought a smile to his lips. In the meantime he had to do what was needed to keep Itani under control. Some time with Elena might serve to calm him down. He reached her at her apartment and asked her to spend the night at the house.

  “How is he?” she asked.

  “Fine. Why do you ask?”

  “I don’t know. The last time we wer
e together, he seemed angry. He scared me a little.”

  Borger forced a dismissive laugh. “He’s a prizefighter, Elena, remember? He’s really a pussycat, just a little tense.”

  “Pussycat? I wouldn’t call him that,” she said. “He can get rough.”

  “But nothing you can’t handle. I remember enjoying rough sex with you. I really think he needs your charms to calm down. How does doubling your fee sound?”

  She agreed to be there at six.

  Borger greeted Elena when she arrived and summoned Itani, who’d been sleeping. Seeing her seemed to brighten Itani’s spirits, and Borger was glad that he’d arranged for her to be there that evening. He’d instructed the cook to prepare what had become Iskander’s favorite dinner, fried chicken and mashed potatoes, and made sure that the makings of a Tom Collins were present and plentiful.

  He left the couple alone, got in his Jaguar, and drove to where he’d made a dinner date with Mica Sphere, a striking forty-five-year-old lesbian who owned a successful custom jewelry store on Pacific Avenue. Borger had discovered the shop a few years earlier and had become a steady, free-spending customer. He and Mica had struck it off from the beginning and fell into an easy friendship, one not marred by sexual expectations. Borger often turned to Mica when he was in the mood for good conversation, and she was always available when he called. Sheldon Borger was unfailingly entertaining. Besides, he enjoyed the finer things of life, which included the best restaurants and choice tickets to prime events. It wasn’t that Borger didn’t find Mica sexually alluring. She was a stunningly beautiful woman, tall and willowy, with a sexy come-hither smile, and Borger seldom left her company without being aroused. Mica was Borger’s only female friend. He considered women sexual objects and tended to treat them that way. But Mica was different. He actually listened when she spoke.