by Mark Russell
'Playing Space Invaders no doubt.'
'No, Ray's got this new game, The Heavens Are Falling. It's totally rad – '
'What'd you just put in your pocket, Dean?'
'In my pocket?' The cornered teenager feigned perplexity.
'Yes, in your pocket!'
Dean turned aside and stared with desperate calculation at a nearby Kiss poster, his blood-drained face mirroring the white-powdered faces of his favourite band.
'Show me what you just hid in your pocket!' Kaplan bellowed, finally venting some of the day's tension. Dean reached shakily into his pocket and put a bottle of eye drops onto the sticker-covered surface of his desk.
'Well, well,' Kaplan said with growing menace. He grabbed the bottle and read its label. 'Experiencing eye strain lately? Must be all that study.' The general shot forward and grabbed his son's shoulder. He reached into the pocket of Dean's jacket and pulled out a folded piece of exercise-book paper. Dean watched with snowballing panic as his father unfolded the find.
'What in Christ's name is this?' Kaplan hissed. His temples pounded as he stared at the rubble of powder strewn across the blue-lined paper. 'What is it? Smack? Angel Dust? What is it, Dean?'
Dean froze from the inside out as his father's booming voice filled the room. But he soon confessed in a bursting, adolescent drawl, 'It's only amphetamine, dad. A little bit is okay. A lot of kids are using it now. It keeps you from vagueing out in afternoon class, and it really helps with end-of-term study. It's not as bad as you think, dad ... it's only amphetamine.'
'Only,' Kaplan repeated, his flushed face level with Dean's. 'Only ... ' He stood back up. Without warning, he backhanded his son, knocking him from his seat and on to the carpeted floor.
Goldman reeled back from the force of the blow. He retaliated with a reverse roundhouse kick that fell short of his opponent's darting head. Brett Becker responded with a Qua Choe back fist strike to Goldman's midsection. The Silverwood chemist staggered back from the powerful strike and quickly formed a Hai Bo forearm defence. Becker lashed out with a left short-hook snap-strike, which untangled his opponent's arms. He followed through with a lightning punch to Goldman's temple. The blow knocked Goldman sideways and on to the mat.
A spiking pain spread across Goldman's skull as he raised himself up on his elbow. He shook his head to clear away the magenta and white flashes dancing on the edge of his vision. He tried to focus on the circular emblem on the back wall of the dojo: a black and white yin yang symbol circumscribed by three sets of broken lines. It was the emblem of Wing Chun Do, an ancient branch of Chinese fighting developed by sixteenth century Shaolin monks.
A Hong Kong national, Huang Tan opened a Wing Chun Do dojo in downtown LA in 1966. Robert Martel, a tough young local, enrolled in Tan's first Wing Chun Do class, and readily embraced the ancient art under Tan's strict tutelage. Years later Martel married a holidaying Australian nurse and migrated with his new bride to Sydney. He eventually opened a Wing Chun Do dojo in inner-city Newtown.
Studying at nearby Sydney University, Goldman enrolled in Martel's classes (after he was set upon by a gang of youths one night after class). Goldman trained under Martel for several years, only stopping when he migrated to the United States. During his time in Sydney, Goldman also learned street-fighting techniques from Michael Donovan, a student flatmate who made ends meet working as a crowd-controller.
Goldman had been at Silverwood Centre for several months when he discovered one of Tan's students, Billy Georgia, had opened a Wing Chun Do dojo in Baltimore. Under Georgia's professional guidance, Goldman had revived his ancient-Chinese fighting skills.
The Australian chemist regained his senses. The black and white emblem on the back wall of the dojo came sharply into focus. He launched himself back on his feet and attacked Becker with a straight-thrust kick to the solar plexus. Before his winded opponent could recoup, Goldman followed through with a lightning strike to the side of Becker's head.
Becker dropped to the ground.
'Point three,' Georgia declared with a loud clap. He waved the next two students on to the mat. Goldman helped Becker to his feet, hardly believing how quickly he'd finished the bout. It'd been a three point, no restriction bout: the head as much a target as the rest of the body. Fortunately for most, the no-restriction bout was a fortnightly event.
'Jesus, Scott. Go a bit easier next time.'
'You can talk,' Goldman said between breaths. He moved his head from side to side, causing several vertebrae to pop in protest. 'Jeez, I think I need a neck brace.'
'Ah, stop your whining.'
'Well, that was my last bout.'
'Yeah, mine too.'
The two of them showered and dressed in the dojo's blue-tiled changing room.
'Coming over to Miguel's for some eight-ball and beer? Gerry and Nathan will be there.'
'Nah, sorry Brett.' Goldman wiped his back with a large beach towel he'd bought in Hawaii. 'No can do, I have to get groceries for a dinner party tomorrow night.'
'Ah well, catch you next week then.'
'Yeah, righto, and I'll charge you the chiropractor's bill.'
'Yeah, bill my secretary.' Becker grinned and left the room, his high-pitched whistle bouncing off the narrow corridor outside.
Goldman finished dressing and stopped in front of the changing room mirror. He ran a brush through tangled hair and thought back to when he dropped Michelle off at her friend's Rosedale apartment. Not a wise move, he concluded for the nth time that evening. Not a wise move at all to give a stranger – albeit a pretty one – Silverwood Centre contraband, along with your private telephone number. With only seconds remaining until “thank you and goodbye”, he'd given Michelle his home number and offered her a lift back to DC on the weekend should she get stuck during her time without a car. He was attracted to her and didn’t want her walking out of his life without any chance of future contact.
She's cool, he decided, checking his features in the lightly misted mirror. He rolled up his soiled outfit and towel and placed them in a sports bag. Like Becker before him, he whistled contentedly as he strolled along the corridor leading to the drizzled pavement outside. A thought plagued him, however, as he pulled up his collar and looked down the rain-spattered street, Hmm, sure hope I'm home if she calls.
Stephen Artarmon towelled himself dry and donned a terrycloth robe. He wiped condensation from off the bathroom mirror before brushing his damp hair in place. He strolled into the living room, his feet encased in backless slippers. A TV news story made him smirk. 'Reagan and Carter bickering again? I can't wait to see the televised debate next week.'
'Carter will get his ass whipped for sure,' his wife said.
'Really, by an old Hollywood has-been?'
'By an ex-governor of California, if you don't mind.' She turned to him. 'Honey, I'm picking up tickets for The Police in Washington next week, right?'
Police? In Washington? Artarmon's mind spun helplessly for a moment, then got back on track. Of course, The Police ... He'd only recently bought their new album, Zenyatta Mondatta. 'Next week? Sure, we can make it.'
'Are you okay, hon? You've been acting kinda weird since I got home.' Pilar Artarmon chewed gum and sat with her legs folded under her on a plush sofa. She blew on fresh nail polish and flexed her hand in the light of an antique Malaysian lamp, its kapur base inlaid with semi-precious stones. Artarmon dropped beside her, pecking her cheek and patting her slim brown knee. 'Yeah, I'm fine, really.'
Artarmon met his wife at a mutual friend's thirtieth birthday bash two years ago. A Filipino of Chinese and Sri Lankan extraction, Pilar was at the time completing her MBA at Harvard. After dancing, drinking and laughing with her for most of the evening, Artarmon fell prey to her exotic looks and charms. He'd pressed for her telephone number and got it from her before she went home with girlfriends. Over ensuing weeks Pilar was never far from his thoughts. He'd had his share of women but none had filled him with such acute longing; none had preoccupied his
thoughts day and night. Accordingly he did all he could to win her, and he lucked out. Sixteen months after meeting, the couple married, out of genuine love, and a way to be rid of the two bodyguards Pilar's father kept constantly about her.
Ferdinand Luahlo was a high-ranking crony in the Marcos regime, having brutally manipulated his country's timber and tobacco markets. Artarmon's in-laws viewed Artarmon with suspicion and dismay, not liking that a middle-class American had snatched away their youngest daughter.
'Come on, babe. Why are you so weird tonight?'
Weird. The word echoed accusingly inside Artarmon as he picked up the TV's remote. 'I'm not weird.' He skipped stations before stopping on an episode of M*A*S*H. Martini glass in hand, Hawkeye Pierce was badmouthing Frank in front of Margaret, denouncing the bumbling surgeon for his adulterous ways. Artarmon tried to follow the thread of the comedy, but his mind was elsewhere. Specifically the foolhardy act of breaking into the Army's Milnet system. Now a part of him wondered why he'd done it. Still he'd covered his tracks – he was safe in that regard. The only possible flaw in the process was Scott Goldman. The Australian's big mouth ...
'Honey, what's your opinion of Scott Goldman? Remember him? That Australian guy who came to our dinner party the other week.'
'Scott Goldman?' Pilar looked up, genuinely surprised by the question, further convinced of her husband's strange mood.
'Yeah, Scott Goldman. What do you think of him as a person?'
She swallowed Perrier water from a glass bottle and stared thoughtfully at the colourless liquid as if bringing the fellow to mind. 'Hmm, I don't know why you invited him. We hardly know him.'
'I get along with him at work, he's an okay guy. So, what do you think of him?
'Well, he's friendly, not bad looking, and his Aussie accent's not too strong ... thank God for that.' She parted Artarmon's bathrobe and slid her fingertips seductively along his thigh, letting him know she was in the mood. If not now, then after dinner. He squeezed her hand tenderly, but brushed it aside.
With a “suit yourself” attitude, she returned to her nails. 'Well,' she said, in a tone which spoke of her want to get to the bottom of what was eating at her husband. 'What's he like?' She paused contemplatively. 'He's intelligent.' She raised a plucked eyebrow for effect. 'But I don't see him as particularly smart ... because he's got a reckless streak. And I imagine it will one day prove his downfall. He can't help it, it's his red hair.'
'Red hair?'
'Sure a lot of redheads are reckless and have a short fuse. It's genetic. Irish genes, or something.'
'Ah, come on.' Artarmon stared at his wife and grinned, but was unable to mask his underlying tension.
'So what's the big deal with Scott Goldman?' She crunched down on a fresh pellet of chewing gum.
'Nothing really,' Artarmon said, before voicing the gnawing little doubt inside him.
'He and I just accessed some classified material at work. Nothing really important.'
She stopped chewing her gum. 'Are you sure?'
'Yeah, just some outdated drug formulas and research programs.'
'Has he got hard copies?'
Artarmon nodded reluctantly.
'Well, he won't go and show them to anyone, will he? After all, he was an accomplice to the act. I'm sure he'll be discreet.'
'He has got red hair, darling.'
'Okay, she said sharply, 'just don't show him anything else. Don't worry, you'll soon be leaving that creepy army place.' She chewed her gum and held her gleaming mauve nails to the light, a figure of confidence.
'Hmm, I guess you're right, I'm making too much of it.'
'As always,' she complained.
He rested his hand on her thigh. 'So what microwave delight awaits us tonight?'
'By the way, Spider's coming tomorrow to take my Jag to the workshop. And I have my doctor appointment at three-thirty. So why don't you leave work early and take me to Doctor Porter's?' She pushed her leg against his and toyed with the front of his hair in a way that usually brought him round to her way of thinking. 'Come on, darling, you know I hate taking cabs ...'
'Pilar, I can't – '
'Your boss won't be there tomorrow, and you said there's not that much to do. There can't be if you spend your time hacking with Scott Goldman. Come on, please.' She puckered her lips in a comical kiss, but her dark eyes spoke seriously of her want.
He analyzed her proposal then blew through his mouth. 'Okay, if you insist, my spoiled little viper.' He leaned across and kissed her porcelain-smooth cheek. 'So ... what's for dinner?'
'Patience, darling.' She tightened the lid on her nail polish. 'A large seafood pizza will be here any moment.'
SEVEN
Goldman lay on his queen-sized bed. Parts of him still ached from the no-restriction bouts at Billy Georgia's dojo. Thank God the gruelling bouts weren't weekly events. His upper-floor apartment was one of six in a brick complex in Towson, on Baltimore's north limit. Light rain fell from a woolly gray sky and the night's undying wind rustled the leaves of a large elm tree outside his bedroom window. A street lamp on the other side of the tree shone through the window's Venetian blinds, casting an eerie dance of shadow and light across the Guatemalan rug at the foot of his bed.
“... it's nine-eighteen on College FM 96, and now a track from Dire Straits' new album Making Movies ...”
Goldman turned down the bedside clock/radio and nestled against propped pillows. He shuffled together the twenty-odd pages he'd copied from the Silverwood computer. He took a deep breath and read the synopsis of a CIA project in the early fifties.
SUBJECT ONE: MK-ULTRA PROJECT
(INCORPORATING SUB-BRANCH CRYPTONYMS:
MK-DELTA, BLUEBIRD AND ARTICHOKE)
RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT IN THE CONTROL AND DIRECTION OF HUMAN BEHAVIOUR THROUGH BIOCHEMICAL PROCEDURES.
A PRELIMINARY SYNOPSIS BY J. A. HUGHES, PhD.
MARCH 21, 1962.
As acting Director of Central Intelligence, General Alexander Dulles approved the formation of Project MK-ULTRA on April 13, 1953.
Pan American Developments authorized $300,000 for initial project funding. MK-ULTRA was to fund and develop projects involving the use of biochemicals in classified military operations.
The principal reason behind the formation of the project and its sub-branches was the Soviet Union's purchase order for five kilograms (fifty-million human doses) of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) from Sandoz Pharmaceuticals in Switzerland in November 1952.
The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) commissioned Dr. Gottchalk's Washington think tank to deduce the motivation behind the Soviet purchase order, and to recommend an appropriate retaliatory response.
The Gottchalk Commission construed the Soviet order as a first step in stockpiling unconventional weaponry that could be used against the United States at an undisclosed juncture. The Gottchalk Commission recommended the following procedures as an appropriate retaliatory response:
a) The immediate issuance of a National Security D Notice upon Sandoz Pharmaceuticals, to effectively override and nullify the existing Soviet purchase order, in compliance with and utilization of Section 102 of the National Security Act of 1947.
b) The immediate issuance of a US purchase order upon Sandoz Pharmaceuticals for twice the amount of LSD as that ordered by the Soviet Union.
c) The immediate formation of a large umbrella project to fund the development of hallucinogens and neuroactive compounds, and to stockpile these chemical agents as a counter measure against Soviet application of similar substances ...
Goldman stopped reading and rubbed his eyes. Who could have imagined that shortly after World War Two his adoptive country had cornered the world supply of an unknown drug called LSD. Sandoz Pharmaceuticals? He stroked his chin and recalled a medical journal article he'd read at university. If he remembered rightly, Dr. Hoffman accidentally discovered LSD at the Sandoz laboratory in the early forties. As a fellow chemist Goldman empathized with Hoffman. He imagin
ed how aggrieved the Swiss chemist must have been when the superpowers scrambled to use the hallucinogen for offensive cold war applications. Ah well, he thought, it wasn't the first time military agencies had railroaded an obscure discovery for questionable ends.
He glanced at his watch, picked up a remote, and turned on the portable TV resting on a small wheeled table at the foot of his bed. He turned up the volume as the nine-thirty finance report began. Four months earlier, Goldman had bought thirty gold coins: one-ounce Krugerrands. After the massive three hundred and thirty dollar drop in the gold price at the start of the year, his stockbroker had predicted the bullion price had nowhere to go but up. After hearing the day's quotation for the Dow Jones Industrial Average, he looked to the screen for the London and New York spot bullion prices.
Three hundred dollars profit, he roughly calculated. So much for my excursion into the world of high-finance. Hmm, least I'm ahead. He turned off the TV and grabbed his bedside phone. Humming to a Marvin Gaye song on the radio, he tapped the phone's buttons.
Belize Cheraz lit a stick of incense. She blew out the quivering yellow-green flame and pushed the perfumed stick into a blob of Plasticine on the shelf above her bathroom sink. The shapely Cuban-exile inhaled the stick's musky fragrance before turning on her tub's faucets. She glanced at the rusty watermark fanning down to the plughole, before inserting the metal plug. She flinched as gas-heated water swirled about her fingers. Dios todopoderoso, this sure beats that crappy burner in Havana, she mused, unleashing more cold water into the claw-footed tub.
She dried her hands, ground out a French cigarette, and pulled a phial of cocaine from her jeans. She poured the narcotic on to a front corner of the sink, then grabbed a razor blade from the medicine cabinet on the wall. She chopped and changed the powder into an even line. Using a tightly rolled dollar bill, she snorted the drug until not a crumb remained. The attractive young Latino groaned with pleasure and looked at a Jim Morrison poster (circa 1967) that she'd pinned to the peeling plaster above the toilet's cistern. Looking through the ghostly fingers of steam rising from the tub, she swore the dead musician winked at her, as if come to life, however lewdly, from his idolographic bondage on the wall.