A Nation of Mystics

by Pamela Johnson

  “So what’s it going to be?” Mick asked him. “You want this deal or not?”

  “Okay,” David sighed. “Come over tomorrow as arranged.”

  “What time?”

  “Early afternoon. Two o’clock.”

  By four that same afternoon, David, Christian, and Joe were back at Joe’s office listening to a recorded replay of David’s car conversation with Mick.

  “What’d you pick up, Christian? You think Mick’s okay?”

  “Mick’s not trying to set you up. At least not deliberately, that much I know. But he hasn’t known this guy for very long.”

  “There’s one way to find out,” Joe told them. “I’ll follow him over tomorrow. If you are being set up, there’ll be a lot of activity around your house.”

  “Okay,” David decided. “Let’s do it.”

  MICK CROGAN AND CHRISTIAN

  BERKELEY, CALIFORNIA

  SEPTEMBER 1967

  The next afternoon, a half hour later than the appointed meeting time, Mick sat on the step in front of David’s house, Ed Wilson impatiently sitting with him. No one was home. They were waiting to see if David would show.

  “He’s usually good about appointments,” Mick told Ed, an embarrassed frown on his face. Ed’s frustration was palpable. “Why don’t we give it a few more minutes? He may have gotten hung up somewhere. I’m really sorry about this.”

  “I thought you said this dude was reliable.”

  “He’ll show,” Mick assured him, uncomfortable. He pulled a joint from his pocket. “Let’s have a smoke while we’re waiting.”

  Ed looked past Mick, staring at nothing. “No thanks. I’ve got an eye doctor’s appointment later.”

  Funny, Mick thought, holding a lighter to the joint and toking. Ed never has smoked with me.

  His uneasiness strengthened.

  Where the fuck is David?

  “I’m going to take a piss out back,” he told Ed. “Be back in a few minutes.”

  Mick walked around the house, found a bush, and unzipped. When he’d finished, he absently peered inside the bedroom window. For all he knew, David could be sound asleep.

  Stunned, Mick could not move his feet.

  Empty! The fucking room was empty! No furniture—nothing!

  That bastard! He set me up today. What the fuck’s going on?

  Suddenly, he felt the game, trapped between two men playing him.

  Mick walked back around the corner of the house, stoned and too sensitive. He tried to keep his voice from shaking. “I think we’d better get back to Berkeley, Ed. Sorry about this. Why don’t I try and set it up later this evening at my house. After dinner?”

  “Sure, but you’d better get on him. I’ve got a lot of other things happening. If it’s not done today, I’ll get it from someone else.”

  “It’ll come together,” Mick tried placating him.

  At the same time that Mick was dropped off at his apartment in Berkeley with a thousand unanswered questions, Jennifer, Joe’s lady and office partner, stood at the filing cabinet looking through photos, pulling up the ones that interested her.

  “I’m pretty sure this is the car we tailed today,” Jennifer said, handing David a picture showing the back end of a green four-door Plymouth with the license number clearly visible. “Joe’ll be out of the darkroom soon, and we can verify it.”

  David passed the photo to Christian. A thin line of sweat had beaded on his forehead ever since Joe and Jennifer’s return from Marin. He absently wiped it away with an unsteady hand.

  Joe walked quickly into the room, holding a wet proof sheet to the light with a pair of wooden tweezers. “I can make larger photos of anything we want to see more clearly.”

  “Joe, the license number of the green Plymouth?” Jennifer asked.

  Joe held a magnifying glass over the small photographic images. “BNR … 820.”

  “Bingo.”

  “Here’s one you’ll love.” Joe chuckled and held the magnifying glass above a picture of a white Ford parked down the street from the numbers on David’s mailbox. “There’s no doubt about it. You’re about as hot as they come.”

  David sat down, his voice drained, his face ashen. “I guess … I guess I’ll try getting Mick on the phone,” he mumbled.

  “The best thing for him to do is split,” Christian told him. “Immediately. Within the hour. Just leave everything and quietly disappear.”

  Mick’s phone had rung twice in the last twenty minutes. He didn’t want to answer it.

  What the hell am I going to tell Ed? I haven’t reached David yet.

  The strident ringing again. Insistent.

  Mick grabbed the phone. “Hello,” he said uncertainly.

  “Mick, it’s me.” David’s voice.

  “You fucker! Where were you today? Where are you now?”

  “Berkeley. Can you meet me?”

  “Where?”

  “Same place as yesterday. Do you have company?”

  “I’m alone.”

  “Good. Make sure you stay that way. Watch to see if you’re followed. Do you hear me, Mick? Make sure.”

  The voice on the other end of the receiver was quietly intense. Somebody—not David—had set him up, and it was all coming together in his mind. Like a jackrabbit caught in a light at night, Mick was frozen, afraid to move, feeling something might pounce. The phone went dead.

  Seconds later, he dashed for one corner of a wall, ripped off a baseboard, took out $5,000 and three hundred hits of acid. Moving quickly, he filled a duffle bag—money, acid, his personal stash, a hookah, a few treasured items.

  The phone again! This time it had to be Ed. He opened the door, listening to the ringing, praying it would not stop. There was still a measure of safety if Ed were somewhere at the other end.

  But at the front door of his apartment building, Mick stopped. Would they be waiting outside?

  He opened the door, desperate to get to the safety of his car, certain it would take him away from danger. He felt that every eye was on him as he walked the half block to where he’d parked. Shakily, he began to drive up and down streets, pulling over, reversing directions, checking. Make sure, David had said.

  At the meeting place near the park, he saw David’s car waiting. He parked, grabbed the duffle bag, tossed it into the backseat of the Porsche, and took a seat inside. Then he crouched toward the floor, trying to hide.

  David smiled at the look on Mick’s face as he pulled away from the curb.

  “Hey, man,” he said soothingly. “It’ll be okay.”

  BREMER AND MYLES

  BERKELEY, CALIFORNIA

  SEPTEMBER 1967

  “Something’s going on,” Bremer told Wilson after the third unanswered phone call. “I think we’d better pick Crogan up.” He turned to Lieutenant Hanson. “You want to be in on this one?”

  “Yeah. I’ll get Phillips.”

  “Wilson, tell me again,” Bremer asked, “are you sure nothing unusual happened at the Marin house?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe something when he went ’round back to piss.”

  “I’d better have one of the boys check the house out.”

  “Phillips stepped out for a few minutes,” Hanson told Bremer, standing at the door of his office. “Where do you want to meet? I’ll give the address to the switchboard.”

  “The After Five Lounge on Solano Avenue,” Bremer answered.

  Hanson stepped into the room. “You mean … inside the bar?”

  “Sure. Why not?”

  “I just don’t like the idea of mixing guns and alcohol.”

  “Listen, Hanson. I’ve worked all over this state, and I’ve always met my men in a bar. A few quick ones before we move in helps steady the nerves. If you have problems with that, maybe you should answer the phones.”

  Bremer opened his drawer and picked up the pearl-handled Colt .45.

  “Let’s go.”

  Bremer noticed the bartender of the lounge eyeing his patrons wa
rily. Bremer and six of his men, loud and unruly, jammed close together in booths, buying three or four rounds. A rising energy surrounded them, an overtone of intense masculinity.

  Almost at the limit of Bremer’s patience, Phillips finally arrived from the magistrate’s office with the arrest warrant. Bremer read over the document, folded it, and shoved it into his breast pocket.

  I’ve got to start keeping a few warrants signed and ready, just waiting to be filled in, he told himself.

  He turned to the loud crowd and shouted, “Last call!”

  Driving to Oxford Street, Bremer fingered his weapon. His index finger moved in circles, nervously massaging the trigger. This was his special gun, this pearl-handled Colt .45. And because Mick Crogan was his birthday gift, this was a special occasion.

  Pulling it from its holster, he watched its chrome flash white with each passing streetlight, his hand stiff as he held it, the rest of his body poised, ready to move.

  The street outside Mick’s apartment building exploded as three unmarked police cars screeched to a halt, red lights flashing, blocking one side of the street. Men rushed the building’s front and back exits. Bremer entered first, moving quickly down the hallway, ignoring the faces of terrified tenants.

  “Police, Crogan! Open up!”

  He pounded with his fist on the apartment door, holding back as far as he could against the wall. No answer. He kicked hard at the door, heard it shatter at its lock, kicked once, twice more, watched as it smashed awkwardly against the wall. The barrier down, he rushed in, ready. For a brief, fantastic moment, he wondered what all these other men were doing with him. He was the hero—one man alone against the bad guys, cleaning up the town, restoring law and order, pushing open the swinging doors of the saloon. Invisible spurs jingled as he walked through the room. His eyes searched for Crogan. If need be, he would stand over Mick’s body, the .45 smoking in his hand.

  “There’s no one here,” Phillips called.

  “His car’s gone,” added Wilson.

  Slowly, Bremer put away the Colt and looked around at the three-room Berkeley apartment, seeing it for the first time. His eyes caught the baseboard pulled away from the wall.

  “Jesus,” was all he managed to say, slightly slurring, suddenly very weary. “He’s gone.”

  Phillips walked over to him. “There’s no one at the Marin house. It’s vacant, cleaned out.”

  “How?” Bremer asked, mostly to himself. “How did they know?” Slowly, he started to come around. “Go over this place. See what you can find. I’m going back downtown.”

  He stopped at the door. “Greg Simpson,” he told Wilson. “The grad student. Get a warrant. Go pick him up.”

  Bremer needed to be alone for a few minutes. Coming off his adrenalin rush, he sat shaking in his car, wet with sweat.

  A perfect set up, blown to bits. We’ll never see Mick Crogan again, don’t even know the names of the people in Marin. My fault. I’ve lost the chance to bust the key runners. The time and energy of this investigation’s netted a single graduate student who sometimes sells ounces.

  Bremer had the queasy feeling he’d been played. Again. A sure bust had been pulled out from under him. Somewhere there was a leak. Someone was watching, passing on information, actively working to ensure that he failed at his job. This wasn’t the first time he’d had a sense of being stalked. He couldn’t even be sure that it wasn’t coming from his own department.

  For the time being, he would keep his own counsel. Maybe include Wilson and Phillips. And wait for someone to make a mistake.

  By noon the next day, Myles had received the news. Although Crogan and the man in Marin were gone, Greg was still in jail. The biology department was humming with the gossip.

  Get a life? How about that power play—huh, Greg?

  He grinned in self-satisfaction.

  Greg Simpson’s arrest brought Myles’s record to twenty-three. Not the twenty-five he’d expected, but not bad. Not bad at all.

  Then, he paused, the grin fading.

  October was only a few weeks away, and the fall quarter would begin. Just today, the department secretary had absently mentioned that Jerry had been offered a small grant for his tuition.

  What would Jerry say when he returned from his three-month prison sentence?

  What would he do?

  Suddenly, some of the smugness deserted him.

  CHRISTIAN AND AMY

  BERKELEY, CALIFORNIA

  SEPTEMBER 1967

  Christian heard the Lotus pull into the driveway of the Berkeley hills home. Seconds later, Amy burst through the kitchen door.

  “Christian,” she cried breathlessly, rushing inside and dropping bags of groceries on the counter, “I met some really groovy people today!”

  “Business or pleasure?” he asked looking up from the Los Angeles Free Press he was reading.

  “Well, both, I guess. They’re with a group called the Family of Man. A lot of their people do acid.”

  “Isn’t that the name of the new vegetarian restaurant?”

  “The same. There’s a communal meeting tonight. I thought it might be fun to go.”

  “Why?”

  “Well, I know we have political motivation, but … sometimes I feel there’s something’s missing in our lives. Some greater sense of spirituality. It … it sort of comes to me when I’m here alone.”

  With no small amount of incredulity, Christian stared at her. True, he’d been spending more time in L.A., then whizzing through the Bay with concerns that needed immediate attention. On two occasions, he’d driven draft dodgers to Eugene, Oregon, the next stop in the underground railroad to Canada. He was working more often with Joe O’Brian, the private investigator, and receiving information from Melvin Sparks, the bail bondsman who was in and out of the police station all day. Surely she understood that these things were important, some even urgent.

  “What are you talking about?” he asked. “Everything we do is both spiritually and politically motivated. Everything. From the organic food we eat to the soap we use. We trip at least once a week. And when are you ever truly alone? Allen and Linda live with us. Our family and friends are always coming in and out.”

  “But most of our friends have lives that are separate from ours. Today, I met people who share everything. Totally!” she cried enthusiastically.

  Christian put down the paper and came to stand near her, leaning back on the counter. “Amy, where’s all this coming from? We share our work with our brothers and sisters. We have a common vision.”

  “But there’s no form to what we’re doing. No ceremony. No doctrine.”

  “Like organized religion?” He was even uncomfortable with the Brotherhood of Eternal Love’s filing for religious status, a sticking point between him and Bob.

  A sudden memory flooded his consciousness—his father in the pulpit wearing a black suit and white collar, gold-rimmed glasses, his hair combed back, confident that his message was right for others. Christian blinked against the image.

  “Why take someone else’s vision for your own?”

  “What happens when truth is revealed to you personally?” she countered, avoiding his eyes. “I mean … actual words from the Source.”

  “Like hearing voices. Like Moses?” He laughed easily, hoping to dissolve her tension. “Are you thinking of becoming a prophet? Starting your own religion?”

  “Moses was a long time ago. I was thinking of something … more recent.”

  “Just what are you thinking?”

  She took a deep breath. “I met the leader of the Family of Man today. Roger. He hears voices leading him to a great mission! He told me he’s the new Messiah!”

  At first, Christian was too shocked to answer. “Are you serious?” he finally asked.

  Amy didn’t want to argue, nor did she want the intellectual putdown she knew would follow if she tried reason. “You’ll understand once you meet him.”

  Christian did want to understand. What did Amy want
from him? Every time he went to a political meeting, she’d pout. Didn’t she understand that love had to be put into action? And for all his faults, he was faithful to her, even when Bob pushed him to taste around.

  “You really want to go to this meeting?” he asked.

  She nodded, smiling hopefully.

  “Alright. I’ll go with you.”

  The floor of the Family of Man’s communal living space was covered with cushions. A soft, diffused light from antique lamps shone over the twenty to twenty-five people seated there. The talk was hushed, introductions subdued. Christian looked over the crowd, a young group, each person perhaps eighteen to twenty-two years of age.

  As Roger appeared, the sounds of the room rose and then fell into silence. Roger was older than the other men. He wore jeans and a collared shirt, sandals, a beaded necklace. His face held a tension. He smiled with overbearing eyes that pierced the corners of the room, and Christian realized Amy was right about one thing: He did have a charismatic presence.

  “I welcome you and give you my blessing,” he called, lifting his hands in a gesture of embrace. “Here in the commune, we live together, work together, share our talents and energies. Once you join, everything is provided. Room, meals, medical care, clothing. In exchange, each of the people of the commune offers a service.”

  He stepped forward, still smiling, looking into individual faces. “A musician can play with the band. You may want to cook, wait, or bus tables. We have a bakery. There’s always a need for a carpenter. Some women devote themselves to housework or childcare for those who work in the restaurant.”

  Pointing to a young woman, watching her beam at his attention, he continued, “Marcia sets up the room for our Tuesday evening House Meetings.” He turned again to the group. “We’re open with each other. Children are welcome. If you have personal problems, I can help you.”

  With more seriousness, he continued, “Thursday evenings are devoted to teachings and tantric exercises. These lessons are reserved for adult members of the commune who live and work together …”