by Matt Eaton
Edna sat down beside her in the armchair. “I’m tired. That vodka has gone to my head. I need to rest.” She slumped back and closed her eyes, making like she was ready to take a nap. But she didn’t close them all the way and saw it had the desired effect on Polina, who lay down on the bed. She mumbled in Russian like she was having a conversation with someone else and trying to make up her mind about something. There had to be someone else listening in. Eventually her breath evened out and Edna knew she was asleep. She rose slowly from her chair, trying desperately trying to remain so as not to wake the Russian. But the room door posed a problem. She didn’t want to close it behind her because the noise would alert them, but she was afraid to leave it open in case a draught forced it to slam, which would be worse. She grabbed one of Polina’s shoes and shoved it under the door like a wedge, leaving it open just enough to squeeze out.
She only needed to be a couple of minutes ahead of them. She took the stairs to the first floor, anxious not to run into one of Polina’s henchmen and unsure of what they would do if she did. There was a restaurant on this level and a service elevator went from here down to the loading dock.
The hotel was just across the road from Union Station. Hidden behind her Russian scarf and sunglasses, her heart pounding on her ribcage like it was ready to burst out, she crossed the road and entered via the station’s main doors, but headed straight out again to the line of taxis waiting outside. She took a taxi across town to Garfinckel’s department store, right by the White House, and spent as long as she dared perusing high-end fashion and bought herself a black scarf and a hat that she donned before jumping another cab for her final destination.
Clarence Paulson looked both pleased and mortified to find her on his doorstep. “I have nowhere else to go,” she told him apologetically.
He ushered her in without a word and closed the door. “Does anyone know you’re here?”
“The Russians, maybe. I tried my best to lose them but I can’t be certain. I set up a meeting with Polina because it was the only way I could think of to shake the CIA.”
“Meaning the CIA now thinks you’re working for the Soviets.”
“Don’t forget the police,” she reminded him. “They think I’m responsible for Helen Barber’s murder.”
He shook his head. “Well, I hope Donald will set them straight on that.”
“Not if he’s the one who had her killed.”
Paulson shook his head. “He wouldn’t do that.”
“I’m not so sure,” she said. “Don’t forget, he’s still covering his own tracks. He doesn’t want anyone to know the Roman debacle was his idea.”
Paulson rubbed his chin pensively. “All right then, what’s the next move?”
The room darkened before she could open her mouth to respond, confirming her suspicion Paolo Favaloro had been listening in. He appeared before them human-sized. She smiled. Paolo might be terrifying, but she also knew he was the smartest person in the room.
She could tell from the look in his eyes he already knew what she required.
THIRTY TWO
Sunday August 23, 1953
Sherman Adams woke early to a shock. Standing at the foot of his bed was the tallest man he had ever seen. For quite some time Adams was convinced he must be dreaming.
“Good morning Mr Adams. My name is Paolo Favaloro.”
Adams had no idea what this giant intruder could want and figured it could be nothing good. But being a man who hung his hat on his powers of persuasion, he decided diplomacy might be the thing that saved him. “Good morning, Mr Favaloro. Would you mind telling me what you’re doing in my bedroom?”
“First of all, and most importantly,” said Favaloro, “you should know I am not really here.”
This gave Adams pause. “You’re not?”
“No.” Favaloro took a step closer.
Adams sat bolt upright in bed. “That’s close enough, please.”
But Favaloro didn’t stop. He sat upon the edge of the bed close enough to touch. “Please, reach out your hand,” he demanded, holding out his own. Adams moved slowly toward a handshake, suspecting this was a precursor to violence, but knowing he was trapped. To his shock and astonishment, he found only thin air where Paolo Favaloro’s hand should be. He began to wave his hand about more freely and found it moved through him like... he wasn’t really there. It was at that point Adams realized there was no indent on the bed where Favaloro’s backside touched the sheets.
“What the hell?” he cried out, suddenly scared he was seeing a ghost.
“I wish you no harm, sir,” Favaloro assured him. “In fact, as you might surmise, I am incapable of inflicting physical injury.”
“How...?” Adams began, his question derailing upon the first syllable uttered.
“While there are many secrets in this world to which you and your president are privy,” said Paolo, “there is much you do not know. First of all, I am not dead. I am very much alive.”
Adams wished his wife Rachel was here to see this, instead of back home in New Hampshire. He found himself flummoxed, but sensed she would know what to make of it.
“I come to you,” Favaloro continued, “on behalf of the Verus Foundation’s representative, Edna Drake. She wishes to meet with you in her office, but circumstances currently prevent her from arranging the meeting in person.”
Adams blinked hard. He knew exactly why Drake was indisposed — the latest CIA report was still in his briefcase. She was the last person he wanted inside the West Wing. “Who are you, Mr Favaloro, and what do you have to do with any of this?”
“I am a man of old. In the Bible, my kind were called the Nephilim. We were the sons and daughters of Anu, the children of the Ryl who lay with human women to produce hybrid offspring. I have been alive on Earth for six thousand years.”
Adams rubbed his hand through his hair, realizing with some degree of annoyance he was not looking his best. Nobody ever saw him this way. “Steady on now, this is all a lot to take in. And none of what you just said went close to answering my question.”
“There is no easy way to do so,” Favaloro replied. “I am alive. Not just in spirit, but in flesh and blood. In your mind this is impossible, yet here I am before you as proof. In spirit, I am free to roam the world. In flesh, I remain locked inside Archivum Apostolicum Vaticanum, the vaults kept hidden by the Papists in Rome. Edna Drake was sent to Rome by Verus to secure my liberation. Alas, the Russians were waiting.”
Adams felt a chill of rising suspicion. “When you say sent by Verus, you mean Donald Menzel. He knows who — and what — you are?”
Favaloro nodded slowly.
“Yet he never thought to mention as much to the President,” said Adams.
“This is the very topic of conversation that Edna Drake had in mind for your meeting.”
Adams thought about it. “She’s been implicated in a murder.”
“Only by association. She had no hand in the killing.”
“That may be,” said Adams, “but she’s radioactive right now. I’m not about to let her walk into the White House, the press would have a field day. And right now, I’m struggling to think of a way Washington’s most wanted woman could have a secret meeting with the world’s most conspicuous man.”
“Miss Drake wants me to inform you she has thought of a way. But it will require the cooperation of your Secret Service.”
THIRTY THREE
Sunday August 23, 1953
The alleyway was empty as Lee Tavon slipped through the rear gate of Verus Foundation headquarters. It was still early in the morning and a light sprinkle of rain had started to fall, which was a stroke of luck for someone trying very hard to remain unseen. He knew the ways to get inside people’s heads and make them forget they’d ever seen him, but memories could never be completely erased — merely hidden from view. It was always better not to be seen in the first place.
Donald Menzel was waiting at the staff rear entrance. His face was glowing red
with the raging anger that he was struggling to contain. Tavon merely nodded and made his way up the stairs towards Menzel’s study.
“I assume the Russians are watching you too,” said Menzel, who was certain Edna Drake’s dealings with the Soviets were a sign of her general incompetence that had inadvertently betrayed them all.
But Tavon said he had seen no sign of the Russians. “She has been careful to avoid me since returning from Rome. Which is why she felt safe in sending me here today.”
But Menzel was in no mood to forgive. “I’ve got the CIA and the White House ordering me to turn her over. Meanwhile she’s AWOL. I tried to get her on a flight to California but I’m told she never showed up at the airport.”
“She’s having a hard time knowing who to trust right now,” said Tavon.
“Is that coming from Edna’s friend, or from the lead representative of the Outherian people on Earth?”
“I am here as both.”
“Meaning she thinks I had Helen Barber killed to teach her a lesson.” Menzel shook his head in disgust. “Maybe I should have done. But goddamn it, Lee, I had no idea those two were meeting.”
Tavon nodded. He was skilled in the art of telepathy and could literally see the difference between truth and lie. It was why Edna had asked him to be here. From what he saw, Menzel believed what he was saying. There was no hint of deception in his voice. To the contrary, he was angry at being wrongly accused of a murder conspiracy by a woman who’d been actively seeking to break her vow of secrecy.
“Who do you think killed Helen Barber?” Tavon asked.
“The way I see it,” said Menzel, “there are three possibilities. Four if you include suicide, but the police don’t believe she shot herself and neither do I. Which leaves the CIA, the Russians, or a crime of passion.”
“But you’re not talking about Barber’s new man,” Tavon realized.
“No. I’m wondering about Clarence Paulson.”
“Why would Clarence want to harm her?”
“Passion can do strange things to normal men. But Paulson is a country mile from normal. He’s fallen in love with Edna and doesn’t want anyone coming between them. More to the point, he won’t like the idea of his lover going to jail for an act of misbegotten journalistic zeal.”
“Edna thinks you were having her followed.”
Menzel bristled. “I told you,” he said, “I didn’t know she met with Helen Barber.”
He was being cagey now.
“A black man was following her,” said Tavon. “When she confronted him, he mentioned you by name.”
Menzel laughed. “Edna spotted this man tailing her? If that’s the case, he wanted to be seen. Her street skills aren’t that good.”
Tavon had to admit he had a point. “Allow himself to be caught – then claim to be working for you.”
Menzel nodded. “The only other point I would make here is that the CIA has done about as much recruiting in the black community as the Ku Klux Klan.”
“Which cuts your list of possibilities down to two,” said Tavon.
THIRTY FOUR
Sunday August 23, 1953
Well aware of how disturbing it could be to humans to witness a man materialize from thin air, Lee Tavon had warned Edna Drake and Clarence Paulson he would return to them at midday precisely. He did so on time, as promised, and they heard the crackling echo of what sounded like distant footsteps immediately preceding his arrival.
This was different to the manifestation of Paolo Favaloro, in that the air in the room vibrated with a static electric charge — a by-product of the dimensional window opening in a confined space. It acted upon the dimensional portal as a sort of early warning system, for those who knew what to expect.
By prior arrangement, he had established the connection for his portal in Clarence Paulson’s own living room. This meant nobody watching the apartment would see him arrive. More importantly, anybody who had tailed him to Verus Foundation HQ would be unaware he’d left.
Tavon noted how accepting Edna and Clarence had become of the alien presence. He wanted to take it as a sign of hope. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small device with a red button, which made a noise like a child’s party clicker when he pressed it. “The portal is closed,” he told them.
Edna ushered Tavon toward Paulson’s dining table, where they talked through his meeting with Menzel. “In short,” Tavon told them, “I don’t believe Donald is responsible for the murder of Helen Barber. He thinks it is most likely either the CIA or the Russians.”
This gave Edna pause. She’d known all along it was a possibility that Polina Ilyin had been lying, but she had very much hoped otherwise. Not because she held any illusion about the Russians’ intentions, but because she liked the woman and thought they had made a genuine connection.
Tavon deliberately avoided mentioning Menzel’s third option. He wanted time to get inside Clarence Paulson’s head — the priest was staring at Edna, waiting for her to speak.
“I don’t think it’s the CIA,” she said.
“No,” Tavon agreed, “it would seem extremely heavy handed on their part – and unnecessary, given neither of you had yet committed an act of treason.”
“But why would the Russians do it?” she asked.
“To drive a wedge between you and your own people,” said Tavon. “Do you agree, Clarence?”
Paulson thought about it nodded. “We saw in Rome what they’re capable of. Edna, you said Polina admitted she was one of Stalin’s murder squad. Human life is cheap to them.”
Tavon touched Edna gently on the arm. “Did you have a clear idea of what you would do if Helen Barber accepted your offer to feed her sensitive information?” He was aware she already blamed herself, but also hoped to elicit a more emotional response from Paulson.
“Not really,” she admitted. “I’ve just had enough of the lies and secrecy. I thought I might be able to force their hand. It was stupid, really.”
“Clarence,” Tavon asked, “did you try to talk her out of it?”
Paulson sat back in his chair as Paolo Favaloro’s warning came to him.
Tavon thinks it might be you.
Tavon heard it too, though Favaloro’s words were only intended for Paulson. Tavon decided to go full frontal. “Paolo is not quite right,” he said, “but he’s close.” He noted the shock on Paulson’s face, but saw no sign of guilt. Cards on the table time. “Donald Menzel told me he thinks there’s a chance it was you who murdered Helen,” Tavon admitted.
“Is Paolo here?” Edna asked. “Why can’t I see him?”
“Because he doesn’t wish to be seen,” said Tavon.
Edna looked searchingly at Clarence Paulson. “Menzel’s wrong, isn’t he? Why would you want to hurt Helen?”
“To protect you,” said Tavon. “To stop you going to prison.”
Paulson was staring at his hands, which were clasped tightly on top of the table like he was saying a prayer in anger. “I get so tired of having you all inside my head, I really do. Can’t a man have his privacy?” He pushed his chair back and stormed off toward the kitchen. “I need a drink.”
Edna stared at Lee Tavon in silent alarm. She felt a sharp pain in her chest. Was it possible? Could he really have killed Helen? If he did, she couldn’t stay here.
Yet she had nowhere else to go.
Paulson returned with two glasses and a bottle of whisky, and poured himself a double before sitting down again. He downed it in one go. “Anyone else?” he asked.
Edna and Tavon both said no.
“I didn’t touch a hair on that woman’s head,” Paulson assured them in a tone of cast-iron conviction.
Tavon nodded. He looked Edna in the eyes. “Clarence is no killer.”
“Which only leaves the Russians,” said Paulson.
THIRTY FIVE
Monday August 24, 1953
It was half past three in the morning. Hardly morning at all, more the middle of the night. Presidential Mess Officer
Lieutenant Commander Leo Roberts tapped his fingers nervously on the steering wheel. He had his truck parked in the District Grocery Store loading dock at Park View. The store was dark. Normal deliveries wouldn’t start for another two hours. This was a one-off.
He didn’t normally run deliveries personally, but couldn’t entrust this one to anyone else. The request had come from Elmer Deckard. A request from Deckard could not be refused without a good reason, because everyone knew it was actually a request from the President himself.
Roberts was trying not to think too hard about the laws they were breaking. The ‘package’ was about the size of a side of beef and wrapped in hessian. Deckard, dressed for the part in navy grey overalls, had this slung across his shoulder. Only the most astute observer would have noticed a human foot as it appeared briefly from under the hessian during loading. Deckard and the goods were on board a moment later.
Only the city’s hardest workers were on the streets before dawn and Roberts was able to make good time on the journey down town. Charlie Friedman was guarding the Pennsylvania Avenue gate and recognized both Roberts and the delivery truck immediately. He glanced at the navy man’s ID briefly and nodded. “Don’t usually see you out and about this early, sir.”
“Special delivery,” said Roberts. “Required the personal touch.”
“You sure you’re in the right place? Mess deliveries usually go up West Executive Avenue to the basement entrance there.”
A jolt of panic up shot Roberts’ spine. “You’re right, Charlie, but I want to get this inside on the Q-T. We’re arranging a lunch that is all hush-hush. I’ve got a bit to move in and the front door access is going to be easiest.”
Friedman’s eyes widened in concern. “You allowed to do that? Mr Adams had my guts for garters last time I let someone in when they weren’t supposed to be let in.”