Marathon Man

by Goldman, William

  And stop, Babe told himself. Right now. He doesn’t care.

  “And?” Janeway said. He sat impassive, watching. Why is everybody staring at me nowadays? Everybody’s got such great eyes nowadays, and they’re all the time staring at me. Biesenthal, Elsa, now this one. Babe wondered, for a moment, about the early symptoms of paranoia. Make a note, he told himself. Check it out.

  “And?” Janeway said again.

  “Don’t stare at me any more.”

  “I’m sorry. It’s only because I was interested.”

  “Don’t humor me.”

  “Then finish up.”

  “Huh?”

  “I want this bubble out of you. I mentioned your father, I touched a nerve, something burst. All that talk of yours was simply a draining process. We’ll never get to what’s important until you’re done. So finish your father.”

  “Nothing more to say.”

  “Fine,” Janeway said. “We’ll leave his guilt in abeyance and get on to other things, if that’s what you prefer.”

  Babe couldn’t believe it. “You didn’t hear one thing I said,” he started, again unable to control either pitch or volume or timbre. “There was no guilt. That’s the whole point to my doctorate, and I’m gonna get my dissertation published, the whole story, I got it all in my head, I been researching it and researching it, I got boxes of notes, facts, not newspaper gossip, not public opinion; I’m clearing my father with truth, just that, nothing else but, but it’ll do the job, you’ll see, you’ll see...” Babe was almost panting now. “Hey,” he said, after a time.

  Janeway looked at him.

  “You made that happen, that last part, about the publishing. I was done except you got me to go on, didn’t you? That was the bubble you were talking about.”

  Janeway shrugged. “I suppose.”

  Babe looked back into the quick blue eyes. “Maybe you’re not as dumb as I figured you were.”

  “I probably am,” Janeway assured him. He flashed a quick white smile.

  Even his goddamn teeth are even, Babe thought. He probably never had a pimple all through adolescence. And then he remembered asking Doc once about pimples and masturbation and if you did the one, did you get the other, because some goon named Weaver had said it was so and Babe had said baloney and Weaver replied, “Yeah, well I never had pimples till I started jerking off, argue with that,” and Babe couldn’t He couldn’t even whip a meatball like Weaver in intellectual debate, and that night he tried to casually get the subject about to acne and onanism and was there maybe some connection, and when he finally managed to do it which wasn’t easy, Doc was serious and reflective before saying, “Newsweek published a study on that, now what the hell were those statistics?” and he closed his eyes and Babe said, “Go on, it doesn’t have to be exact just kind of a general idea,” and Doc said, “There is absolutely no causal relationship between blackheads and beating your meat and it also doesn’t cause feeble-mindedness,” and Babe said, “I knew Weaver was full of it,” and Doc said, “The odd thing they found was that excess lying lengthens the nose,” and Babe was halfway through an empathetic nod before he realized that Doc had nailed him again, skewered him, taking advantage of Babe’s unending supply of gullibility, except that when Doc did it, you couldn’t get mad; no, you could, but you had to laugh first.

  Babe could feel himself starting to lose control. I hope this guy goes, he thought. Soon. He got up and poured himself some Burgundy.

  From across the room, Janeway said, “I’m still looking for a motive. A specific. Why was tonight different from any other night?”

  Babe came back and sat down, thinking that Janeway was far from a dummy, because that was a Jewish expression he’d just used, a paraphrase of one of the questions in the Passover service.

  “Why don’t you start and tell me what happened this evening?”

  “I was home. He came in. He died. The police came. You came.” He swirled and sniffed the wine, thinking how Doc would have described the nose and he would have faked a snore.

  Janeway leaned toward him. “That’s everything? You couldn’t possibly have left out any minor details or along those lines?”

  “I’m a demon on details.”

  “You mean you want me to do some explaining now, is that it?”

  “I think it’s important,” Babe said.

  Janeway sighed.

  Babe just sat there.

  “You have no idea how much I’ve been dreading this,” Janeway said. “You have every right to know, but it’s still embarrassing; I hate it, it all gets so goddamned never-never land.” He took a breath, plunged in. “You don’t really think your brother was in the oil business, do you?”

  “’Course he was, for years, how the hell do you think he earned his living?”

  “I know exactly how he earned his kopeks, and believe me, the closest he came to the oil business was when he filled up at his friendly Standard station.” Janeway shook his head. “You’re amazing, you know that? He always said you were gullible, but this gullible I never dreamed.”

  Janeway was full of it.

  “He wouldn’t lie to me. We never lied to each other —oh sure, maybe fibs, like that, but hell, everybody fibs once in a while.”

  “All right, where did he live?”

  “Washington.”

  “And what’s Washington the center of?”

  “Everything: the government.”

  “Okay. Now are you aware just how much each part of the government hates each other part? Example, the military: The Army hates the Navy and the Navy hates the Air Force. Why? Because once upon a time the Army was it, and then the world changed and the Navy became the glamor branch, and then flip, another change, and now the Air Force gets everything it requests while the admirals and the Army generals eat it. Think of what’s going on down there today—it’s on TV all day long, plain and crappy. The FBI hates the CIA, and they both hate the Secret Service. They’re squabbling and whining, continual internecine rivalry, and the whining gets loudest when you get close to the limits of their powers. The edges are sharp, and between those edges are crevices.

  “We five in the crevices,” Janeway said, after pausing, taking a swallow, giving it a paragraph for emphasis. He’s really a fantastic liar, Babe thought.

  “We were formed when the crevices widened. Date it after the Bay of Pigs, if you like. Now, when the gap gets too large between what the FBI can manage effectively and what the Secret Service, say, can bring off, more than likely, we’re called in.”

  “And you’re who?”

  “This is where it gets embarrassing if you’ve the least intelligence. I’m a Dartmouth graduate, honors, and all the code names and passwords are enough to make you scream. We’re The Division. That’s all. Capital T, capital D. Which is a totally inaccurate name, since we exist only because of the divisions between other groups.”

  “What do you do?”

  “Provide. That is how we’re referred to. I was a Provider until I more or less got promoted into the executive end; if I live long enough and don’t behave too stupidly, I’ve got as good a chance as anyone of running things. Finding your brother’s killer wouldn’t be unhelpful to my cause. He was a Provider when he died.”

  “What did he provide?”

  “Anything that was necessary.”

  “That’s kind of vague.”

  “Yes, isn’t it.”

  “When you say anything, you don’t mean anything?” No reply.

  “I mean, you don’t mean, well, not bad things.”

  “Isn’t that a fairly simplistic way for an historian to view the present world struggle for ultimate power? ‘Good things. Bad things. Meanies.’”

  “He wouldn’t ever hurt anybody. I’m positive of that. I don’t care what you say.”

  “Do you know who Scylla was?”

  “’Course, but Scylla wasn’t a ‘who,’ Scylla was a ‘what,’ a giant rock off the coast of Italy.”

  “Scylla was y
our brother’s code name.”

  Babe shook his head. He wanted fresh air, except he didn’t, not really, but he did want something. Doc, I guess, Babe thought. I want Doc back.

  “Shake your head all you want, it’s true.”

  “You’re telling me my brother was a spy—I’m sorry, Provider—and I never even had a notion.”

  “I’m telling you your brother was a top Provider because you never even had a notion. He always drank Scotch, except with you it was wine. There wasn’t a hand gun made he hadn’t mastered, except with you he always pretended to panic at a BB pistol. I think the single thing that frightened him most was that someday you’d confront him with all this.”

  “Why?”

  “He dreaded your disapproval.”

  “Why? I used to copy him. If he started using an expression, I’d pick it up. The way he walked, facial expressions, I used to love it when I could wear his hand-me-down clothes. I...” He lacked the energy to go on. He was tired and dirty, and the news rocked him, and even before that he’d been exhausted; the outburst about his father had taken a lot out of him. Defending was always so hard. How great life must be if all you ever did was attack. Wouldn’t it be terrific to wake up one morning and find yourself Attila the Hun?

  “I’m sorry,” Janeway said, his voice gentle.

  “Is that it? Do I know everything now?”

  “You know nothing, maybe a particle, at the most. I promise you, Dave’s death will not be written up in the Daily News, that’s all been taken care of.”

  The blows were coming at him from all angles now, and he was helpless to stop them. “Dave... ?” Babe blinked. “Dave... ?”

  “We all called him that, he wanted us to. Obviously, you know it’s his middle name, Henry David Levy.” Babe leaned back and closed his eyes. “All my life we were together, and I never once called him that. ‘Hank’ in public, and ‘Doc’ was our name. From I Love a Mystery. That was his favorite. He was always going on about Jack, Doc and Reggie, and for a while I called him Reggie, but he said, ‘No, I’d rather be Doc,’ so that was it. And when I was eight he took me to a little-league game and I was pitching, H.V. was supposed to bring me but he was too bombed, so Doc did, and I hit a homer. My very first real one. I mean actually hitting it over the outfielder’s head. They were playing me in, I guess, seeing as I was the pitcher and pitchers aren’t supposed to be much with the bat, and it was such a thrill that when we walked home I said, ‘Doc, I’m giving up pitching, I’m not gonna be any big-league pitcher, that’s kid stuff, I’m goin’ for the long ball, Doc, I think I’ve got a shot at Babe Ruth’s record,’ and from then on I was Babe, except when there were strangers around,” and then, his eyes still closed, the cry “I don’t know anybody” broke across the room. After a moment, Babe said, “I’m sorry, I’m fine now.”

  Jane way stood and started moving around the room. He opened his eyes. “Dinner,” he said. “Begin there.”

  “Dinner was fine, dinner was terrific; no—wait a second, it wasn’t, that’s right, dinner was awful; it seems so long ago, what time is it?”

  “Almost one o’clock.”

  “That’s all?”

  “Dinner was awful,” Janeway was saying, moving quietly now, here, there, always gracefully moving. “Can you be a little more specific?”

  “It was at Lutece and there was me and Doc—me and Dave, you’d say—and my girl, Elsa, you want her full name?”

  Nod.

  “Elsa Opel, she lives up around Columbia, four one one West One hundred thirteenth, phone number four two seven four oh oh one—” Babe stopped. “Why aren’t you taking notes if it’s all so important?”

  “Because we’re trained to put nothing down, it’s best that way.” Then he rattled off “Elsa Opel—four one one West One one three—four two seven four oh oh one.” He sipped lightly at his wine. “I assure you I’m paying attention. Go on.”

  “Well, it... the first hour, maybe, Doc couldn’t keep his hands off her, she’s gorgeous, and he was pawing her like he was in heat.”

  Janeway took a longer drink.

  “Then it turned out he was just getting her guard down, and when she was all softened up he got her to admit she’d been lying to me about her age, and where she was from, a lot of things, and she was humiliated and ran out, and Doc and I had words, and then I ran out and looked for her and couldn’t find her and came back here hoping she’d call. She did, but then Doc arrived, and the rest you know.”

  “Okay, push this now, really go back over it all in your mind. Let’s try and re-create a little—there’s blood all over the stairs, so clearly he wanted desperately to get here. Was it just to see you? Could there have been any other reason? Anything at all?”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t know, but did he ever leave anything here, keep anything here, send himself mail here—along those lines?”

  “Never. No sir.” Babe shook his head, trying to remember. “I mean, you can go through his suitcase if you want, but I think it’s just a few clothes, toilet articles; you can examine it all you want.”

  “I’ll take it with me when I leave, if you don’t mind. We’ll run some checks, for the hell of it, but it probably won’t come to anything.”

  “He appeared in the doorway suddenly—leaning against it—he said my name, then again, loud, “BABE” —and then he crumpled and I caught him and held him till he died. Maybe I rocked him a little.”

  Janeway rubbed his eyes. “Not a bad beginning, I suppose.”

  “I don’t get you—‘beginning’? What comes next?”

  “I can’t say for sure, because this is a situation where we can only counterpunch, which we’ll do. But I can guess that whoever killed Scylla wouldn’t have risked it if some situation somewhere wasn’t coming to a head. It’s also not unreasonable to assume they thought he knew something. And since he lived here when he was in town, and since he died here, if I were in their position I’d feel justified in assuming you knew something too. Or might. People do, it’s known, say strange things when they’re dying. Conclusion: If I were whoever killed him, I’d sure as hell like to ask you a few questions.”

  “But I’m ignorant—I’m not even involved, not in anything.”

  “I know that and you know that, but tell me, how can they know that?”

  Babe was a little short of answers.

  “Tom?”

  “Yes sir?”

  “I’m going to say something just rotten to you now, for two reasons. First, because I believe it’s possible, and second, because I want to scare the shit out of you so you’ll do exactly what I tell you.”

  “Listen, Mr. Janeway—hold it a sec. I’m not gonna disobey you, I promise. I’m edgy enough as it is.” Janeway nodded, began packing up Doc’s belongings. “Fine. I was just going to tell you what I think’s going to happen to you.”

  “I’m not so sure I want to hear that,” Babe said, and then he said, “What do you think’s gonna happen to me?”

  Janeway looked over from his packing. “I think they’re going to try to capture you, and then I think they’re going to try to torture you, and then I think they’re going to try to kill you...”

  20

  Janeway finished packing in silence. “You still there?” he asked after a while.

  Babe nodded.

  “That really was only a guess, but after a while, you develop a sense for these things, a feel for the way other minds operate. And in our business, whenever anyone in our immediate family’s damaged, we automatically assume it was wasn’t accidental. Dave told me about your mugging and why he was coming—to try to get you down to D.C. for a while.” He started fastening the suitcase. “He left some extra stuff here, I think, for when he ran short.”

  “Quit trying to trick me—you asked me that already, did he leave anything, and I told you already, no.” Return of the quick smile. “I guess you weren’t your brother’s brother for nothing.”

  Babe started with
Janeway toward the door.

  “I’m at the Carlyle—we oil types live well—it’s just a quick shoot across the Park, call me whenever you want—seven four four one six oh oh, Room Two one oh one.” He reached for the doorknob. “Now listen to me—we won’t have our own surveillance working on you till morning, the police will handle things till then, and I haven’t got unbounded faith in New York’s finest. So what you do is this: You stay locked in here overnight, okay?”

  “Surveillance, for Chrissakes?”

  Janeway spun on Babe. “I’m not telling you to turn hermit, I’m just saying stay inside till I have faith in the personnel.”

  “And then what? I get to go through life with some crew-cut jerk sneaking around after me?”

  “For you, as a special treat, nothing but intellectuals and longhairs. Now look—I worked alongside Dave a long time, we were very close, believe that, and we’ll meet in hell, and I’ve got plenty to answer for, but I’m not about to let him chew my ass off for not watching after you. So do what I say and shut up.”

  “If you’re so worried about my health, why are you leaving me alone, then?”

  Janeway put the bag down. “I thought it was obvious. How are we going to find who killed him if they don’t come after you? You think we’re dealing with morons? You think they’ll break in here and say ‘Shucks, he’s moved out’ and then we’ll jump them from the closets and say ‘Put ’em up, you dirty guys?’ If you’re not here, they’ll know it, and they won’t come. If you are here, they probably won’t come anyway. It’s risky, they know how our minds work, they’ll guess surveillance. But if they’re desperate, and I think they are, then they’ll come.”