The Stickmen

by Edward Lee

  He’s probably right, Garrett considered. “Okay, I agreed to no questions. But let me ask you one thing.”

  “All right.

  “Why? Why are you giving this to me?”

  Swenson rubbed his chin in the thought. “Repent ye, and ye will be saved’? I don’t really know, Harlan, but I doubt that it’s anything so dogmatic. Doesn’t matter anyway, really. I’ll be dead in a matter of weeks or even days. Were I more of a man, had I more resolve and more conscience—if I were more like you, Harlan—I might’ve done this years ago. I can’t do anything now, though. I can’t even get out of bed.”

  Swenson broke into a coughing fit, his frail chest heaving. At this precise moment, with all he’d been told, Garrett didn’t know which way was up, and even though he’d always thought of Swenson as his worst enemy in the past, it pained him now to see the bald old man in such distress. Garrett gulped, holding the tiny envelope.

  “You want me to call one of the SP’s?”

  Swenson shook his head through the rest of his coughing fit. “No, no, it comes and goes. I’m all right…but—” His words fell off, and he…sniffed. “Harlan, I don’t mean any offense by this but have you showered anytime recently?”

  That’s just great. “My water got cut off because I couldn’t pay the bill,” he recited, embarrassed. “I was on my way to Nero’s Roman bath-house Y when your two Keystone Cops hauled me off the street.”

  Swenson’s brow narrowed. “You can’t pay your water bill?”

  “Or my phone bill, if you must know. But that’s fine because if my phone’s not working then the NSA can’t tap my calls anymore.”

  “You’re broke, in other words?”

  The frown seemed to stretch Garrett’s face. “I’d call it a mere matter of temporary financial insolvency.”

  “You’re broke; we can’t have that.” Swenson pressed a buzzer by the bed. Instantly an SP popped into the room, pistol in hand.

  “Everything all right, General?”

  “Yes,” Swenson said. “Get twenty thousand dollars out of the safe and give it to Mr. Garrett.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The SP vanished.

  Garrett almost relieved himself in his jeans. “Gee, thanks…Dad.”

  Swenson’s face was getting pink again, another coughing fit coming up. “This is no joke, Harlan. For what it’s worth, I always liked you. I’ve always thought of you as something of a wayward son.”

  “Let’s not get carried away,” Garrett said.

  “I’m sorry things couldn’t have been different.”

  Garret felt oddly choked up.

  “Go now, Harlan. Time is of the essence. And good luck.”

  “Thanks… I think.” Garrett, still mystified, was about to turn and leave, not even knowing what he was leaving to—

  “And, Harlan?” Swenson stifled a cough.

  Garrett turned back to him.

  “Be very careful.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The basement was Danny’s favorite place now, though he wasn’t sure why. It was dark and cool and quiet. Something about the cement-and-cinder-block walls helped him feel at ease.

  He guessed that maybe the Stickmen couldn’t talk through the cement-and-cinder-block walls. He didn’t like it when the Stickmen talked to him. It always made his head hurt like after the time he got hit with softball during gym class.

  Down here they never talked to him.

  Danny was doing another picture now, not with paint like in Miss Romesch’s art class but just with colored pencils. He was sitting up at his dad’s work table and had the lights turned on. This was his favorite place to draw.

  Danny liked to draw—it was his favorite thing to do—and maybe Miss Romesch was right; maybe he should be an artist when he grew up. One time even his mother had said that, “With your drawing talents, Danny, you could work for an advertizing firm when you grow up, or one of those computer graphics companies, and you could make a lot of money.” But before Danny could even think to say anything in response, his father had grumbled from the couch: “Honey, Danny’s not going to be any candyass artist, for God’s sake. That’s not a man’s job. He’s going to be a soldier. He’s going to go to West Point, and he’s going to go to jump school and Ranger school, and he’s going to be a hardcore Army combat officer. Right, Danny?” and then his dad had leaned over an patted him on the back. “Only sissies are artists. You want to be a soldier, right?”

  “Yes, Dad,” Danny replied because he knew that if he said anything else, then his dad might start yelling like he did a lot when he was drinking beer, and his mother would start crying, and it would all be Danny’s fault. One time his father had told him that once he got into high school he could try out for the football team, but Danny had never been too good at sports and he said he didn’t want to. Boy, was that a mistake! Pretty soon mom and dad were shouting at each other. “Jesus Christ, Joyce!” dad had yelled, “you’re turning the kid into a little pansy the way you coddle him. All he does is sit around and draw pictures when he should be out playing little league and toughing himself up for life,” and then his mother had shouted back, “You can’t force your son into being what he doesn’t want to be!” “Yeah, well I’ll be goddamned if I’m going to let you raise him to be a queer!” They’d argued some more until dad slapped mom hard across the face. Danny hated seeing that; it must’ve been his fault too.

  He guessed it was just better to do what his dad told him to do.

  Today he’d drawn the Stickmen’s ship again, only closer this time: the big light bar on the bottom and the trapezoidal windows on the side. He couldn’t remember what the inside looked like, but he knew he’d been there at least once. The next picture was the first Stickman he’d seen, the one that had come into his room, and the next was him getting into the ship the night they’d shown him where it was.

  I wonder what I should draw next… I know!

  Danny began to draw the gloves…

  ««—»»

  Garrett’s car was not what many would call a primo set of wheels: a ‘76 Chevy Malibu whose shiny candy-apple-red lacquer had long since gone over to something like the finish and color of house-bricks. The A/C didn’t work, the radio didn’t work, and the windows didn’t roll down, but Garrett figured as long as the wheels turned, then it beat taking the bus.

  Before he’d set out, he’d paid his phone bill, his water bill, his back rent plus a month in advance. He paid his tab at Benny’s Rebel Room, and Craig had almost fainted. Then he went home and took a shower. So far, so good…until he’d called Jessica.

  She’d changed her number.

  Just playing hard to get, he thought. She loves me.

  But as for Swenson and his “assignment, Garrett still didn’t know what to make of…ANY of it, and since it was his nature to be suspicious—in fact, it was his job—there was no one he knew in the world who warranted more suspicion that General Norton Swenson. The twenty grand was a life-saver, and Swenson’s hubbub about actually liking Garrett and even thinking of him as a surrogate son seemed strangely sincere. But Garrett acknowledged one possibility with no hesitation whatsoever.

  This whole thing could be another set-up. Swenson had admitted that he’d been a disinformation officer for the A.I.C.

  Maybe this is just more disinformation, and like a sucker, I’m falling for it. I’m doing THEIR work for them…

  Whatever the case, he’d find out soon enough.

  The sun was going down by the time he’d made it to Annapolis. Route 50 cut a great swath toward the Chesapeake Bay, and just a few miles before the bridge, Garrett found his destination. Talk about out of the way, he thought. He’d almost missed the looming U-STORE sign, which was not illuminated. The Malibu’s tie-rods shimmied as Garrett motored up a winding service road until he eventually idled into a long deserted parking lot. The lot was plunged in darkness, and there was no sign of a security guard.

  “Great place for a murder,” he muttered. He
turned on the dome light and slipped out the key Swenson had given him. A standard brass disk-tumbler; the engraving read: #A-104.

  Garrett got out, flicked his cigarette, then stalked ahead with his flashlight in hand. Before him stretched multiple rows of long connected storage units; each unit was fitted with a garage-type door. Garrett stumbled amongst the rows for a good twenty minutes before he found it. He had to work the key back and forth several times before it grittily turned. Then, “Oooof!” he exclaimed once he grabbed the handle and pulled. The door didn’t budge. Damn it, Spock, I’m a writer, not a fuckin’ fork-lift. Either this door’s heavier than William Howard Taft or it hasn’t been opened in years. Several more back-bending tugs got some play, then the rust-choked track-wheels began to grind in their rails. Finally the door clattered open.

  Garrett scanned the interior with his flashlight.

  The storage unit was empty save for a single small black suitcase.

  “Somehow, I don’t think it’s Jack the Ripper’s medical bag…”

  The damn place didn’t even have an overhead light; Garrett’s puny flashlight would have to do. He knelt at the case, noticed that it was scuffed, crackled, and very old.

  When he flipped open the top, he pointed the flashlight in, and—

  ««—»»

  The sign on his desk was an impressive one; the engraved brass plate read: “The Honorable Willard G. Farrell, U.S. Court of Appeals.”

  The job, though, wasn’t nearly as impressive as the sign.

  It was ten o’clock at night, and Judge Farrell was still in his chambers. Taking the world of the judiciary by storm? Balancing the scales of justice? Making the country a better, fairer place for the citizens protected by the Constitution?

  Hardly.

  Interlocutory reviews and assessments, one right after another. The Federal Trade Commission, the National Labor Relations Board, the Securities and Exchange Commission, plus discretionary territorial-court-reviews for more trademark and copyright appeals than he could shake his gavel at.

  GodDAMN, this is dull, the judge thought behind the wide, cluttered desk. Dull, yes, but the pressure was on; it always was. If Judge Farrell made even the most minute oversight, the case could be taken to the Supreme Court, and those were twelve curmudgeons he definitely didn’t want quoting him in a reversal that might go down in history.

  Behind him, in the window, Washington, D.C., glittered below a smear of stars. Farrell hoped the sun wasn’t rising when he finally finished up.

  He was wearily rubbing his eyes when his door opened.

  “Another long day, huh, sir?” a beefy U.S. Marshal named Willy asked. The Marshals provided security for the building; Willy was the captain of the night watch…

  “You got that right, Willy. Sometimes I think the federal offenders do this

  to me on purpose because they know I don’t get overtime.”

  Willy made a modest chuckle. He looked around the dark office. “You’re the only one here tonight, sir?”

  “Yep. Just me and my lonesome, the judge regretted. “My secretary and research assistants are long gone, because they do get overtime. The GOP’s gonna cut the federal budget, all right, and it looks like they’re starting with my staff.”

  “But look at the bright side, Your Honor. They’ll have more to pump into the Graffiti-Artists Rehabilitation Program.”

  Farrell laughed, because there actually was such a federal spending program.

  “You look pretty tired, sir. You want me to send one of my men across the street for coffee?”

  “No, thanks, Willy. I’ve got a pot cooking.”

  “Okay. I’ll tell the lobby guard you’re still here.”

  “Thanks. With any luck I’ll be out of here in a few more hours.”

  “Goodnight, Your Honor.”

  Willy left, leaving Farrell to make more notations behind the opened legal tomes on his desk. At least the U.S. Marshals in the building let him feel safe, not that there was any danger in this blasé office. If he were a federal prosecutor on RICCO case, that would be different. But there were no Gottis or Giancanas in this building.

  Judge Farrell didn’t see the shadow slide like a pool of ink from out of the book cove. And he didn’t hear the tiny pop! of the CZ83’s chamber-silenced .380 round.

  The Honorable Willard G. Farrell was dead before the modest bullet had time to exit his skull. The judge slumped forward, his face landing on a sheet of review criteria outlining the functions of the Sherman Antitrust Act.

  The clandestine field operative, sometimes known as QJ/WYN, sometimes known as John Sanders and an array of other aliases, emerged from the shadowed book cove.

  He cast a passing glance toward the window, noticed the U.S. Capitol dressed in spotlights. Next, he removed a small black notepad from his jacket pocket. He flipped it open to reveal a simple list of names.

  The first name on the list was URSLIG, J., and it had a red X through it.

  QY/WYN drew another red X through the next name: Farrell, W.

  SWENSON, N. came next, and after that: UBEL, K.

  The last name on the list was GARRETT, H.

  CHAPTER SIX

  “Don’t be nervous,” Myers said, running a finger under his tight collar.

  “Aren’t you nervous?”

  “Yes.”

  Lynn wore a nice dandelion-yellow business dress, and Myers, his best charcoal-gray suit. They both stood uneasily in the spotless, well-appointed office.

  The crested plaque on the white wall behind them read: THE OFFICE OF THE VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.

  A grumpy, matronish secretary with bunned hair and an immense bosom sat at the reception desk. She seemed disapproving at she pretended to proofread some stenography.

  She knows spooks when she sees them, Lynn considered.

  She and Myers were here for a quick congratulatory meeting with the vice-president, pretty much just an official pat on the back for an operation several months ago in which they’d burned a Red Chinese double-agent at Sandia National Laboratories, and left him no choice but to come over to them.

  “Best thing about field commendations is you never have to worry about where to

  hang them,” Lynn remarked.

  “Yeah,” Myers agreed. “Can you imagine how pissed off Willie Mays would be if he was ordered not to reveal his entry into the Hall of Fame?”

  “Duty and service, that’s all we care about, right? And the great pay.”

  Myers chuckled. Awards and commendations such at this were, of course, classified, and only existed as indexes in some computer file or book in a safe. It seemed as silly as the CIA’s memorial to operatives who’d died in the line of duty; a wall in the lobby of Langley Headquarters displayed fifty-one brass plaques that were blank.

  The frumpy secretary shot up a pinched glared when Lynn’s cell phone rang. Damn it! Who’s calling me here, for God’s sake! Lynn quickly retrieved the phone from her purse.

  She began to whisper, “Cred 667-401—”

  “Hi, honey, it’s me—”

  It was Garrett.

  Lynn winced, stepped back deeper into the office. “Damn it, Harlan!” came the fierce whisper. “How did you get my field number? It’s classified!”

  Garrett’s tone over the line reeked with calm arrogance. “I hacked it out of a discreted directory from Arlington Hall’s intra-server net. Also got your new home number, your new fax, and your new email. Took me all of—oh, say, two minutes. You got a new car too, huh? And a new hopper-frequency chip for your laptop? Screencode L-26-12?”

  Instant rage made Lynn’s face feel crushed by a vise. “You know I can never, ever take personal calls on this line! Never, ever—”

  “This is important, Lynn, I mean really im—”

  God! This is embarrassing! In front of my boss even! “Right now I’m standing in the Old Executive Office Building, and I’m about to meet the Vice President for God’s sake! Call me later! On my unlisted home line
that you’ve obviously already illegally ascertained!”

  Seething, Lynn turned the phone off, put it back into her purse.

  “Your crackpot ex-husband?” Myers took a good guess.

  “Unfortunately, yes.”

  “So how’s our favorite paranoid, oddball tabloid writer doing these days? Has he found Bigfoot yet?”

  “Don’t know, don’t care.”

  “Hell, last time I saw him, he looked like Bigfoot. The long hair and the shaggy beard.”

  “He shaved the beard. So now he just looks like a—”

  “—a paranoid, oddball tabloid writer.”

  The dour secretary’s bosom seemed to heave when she huffed at them, “The Vice President will see you now.” Then her weasely eyes indicated the double doors across the room.

  “I thought Aunt Bee died a while back,” Myers said in the lightest whisper.

  The double doors opened as they approached, a Secret Service agent on each knob. Lynn and Myers prepare to enter, adjusting their collars, checking for last-second lint. Butterflies bloomed in Lynn’s stomach; she could see the VP reading something at his broad cherrywood desk. Here goes, she thought.

  Just as she would enter the office, her cell phone went off again.

  No, no, NO! She snapped it right up to her ear. The secretary was scowling at her.

  “I’m onto something really hot here, Lynn,” Garrett said, “and I need your help. I want you to come to my apartment tonight.”

  “Harlan!” she said through her teeth, to keep from screaming at him, “I just told you, I’m about to meet—”

  “Yeah, yeah, the Vice President, big deal. He’s washed up anyway. He’ll never beat the fund-raising rap and the tobacco-lobby contradictions. If he thinks he’s gonna be the next president, my name’s Colin Powell.”