Desperate Measures

by David Morrell

  with the weapons once you own them. Those problems bothered me ever

  since I heard that Millgate was under suspicion. And then the solution

  came to me. Of course, The way you get rid of the nuclear weapons

  enables you to pay for them in the first place-you sell them to Someone

  else."

  Gable squinted. "I'm impressed, W. Pittman." 6 'The compliment

  doesn't sound sincere."

  "But I am impressed. you see to the heart of the issue. You understand

  the brilliance of the operation."

  "Brilliance?" Pittman asked in disbelief.

  "The threat of the nuclear weapons in the former USSR is eliminated,"

  Gable said righteously. "At the same time, it's possible to maintain

  the balance of power in other troubled regions. For example, it's no

  secret that North Korea has been working ftniously to develop a nuclear

  capability. What do you think will happen when its nuclear weapons are

  functional? It'll control Southeast Asia. But if South Korea also

  gains nuclear capability, there'll be a stalemate. They'll balance each

  other." 'Wrong. They'll destroy each other. And maybe get the rest of

  the world involved," Pittman said.

  "Not necessarily. " The emotional strain of the conversation was having

  an evident effect on Gable. His breathing was more labored, his posture

  less erect. He lowered his voice. 11 "To save the world, sometimes

  risks have to be taken.

  "And bank accounts fattened? You hypocrite. You and Your friends

  pretended to be selfless public servants, and all along, from the

  forties onward, from the postwar anti-Soviet policy to the h-an-Contra

  anns-dealing scandal, you've been making a fortune in kickbacks from the

  weapons industryHow much money did you earn arranging to use American

  funds to arm Iraq so it would act as a counterweight against Iran? And

  then we went to war against h-aq, and you received kickbacks from the

  arms industry because you recommended that war."

  Anger made Gable regain his rigid posture, "I refuse to discuss the

  nuances of foreign policy with a mere reporter. You are not privy to

  classified information. You are not in a position to judge the delicacy

  of various negotiations that I have successfully concluded for the good

  of the United States and the world."

  "Right. The old excuse. There's always secret information that

  justifies becoming rich by starting more wars and selling more weapons."

  "These matters are beyond your understanding," Gable said. "You are

  here for one purpose only-to try to settle our differences, to undo the

  disastrous effects of your blundering into matters that do not concern

  you. After the leak implieating Jonathan in the purchase of Russia's

  nuclear weapons, it was only a matter of hours, perhaps minutes, before

  reporters would have shown up at the hospital in hopes that Jonathan

  would be strong enough to make a statement. We had to get Jonathan out

  of the hospital to keep him from telling reporters what he intended to

  tell the priest. You were there when' my men took him from the

  hospital. You followed them to Scarsdale. Damn it, what were you doing

  in his room? If only you hadn't gone into his room."

  "His IV tubes had slipped out. His oxygen prongs weren't attached to

  him. He was having some kind of seizure. I was sure he was going to

  die."

  "That was the idea, " Gable said with barely subdued irritation. "My

  colleagues and I said gow-bye to him. Everyone except his nurse and

  doctor left the room. They removed his life supports. Then they left.

  He was supposed to die. But you had to get into the room and reattach

  the supports. And he finally had a chance to confess. If the nurse

  hadn't come back into the room at that moment, we never would have known

  that Jonathan had betrayed us."

  "If only we'd stopped right there," Sloane said.

  "We couldn't," Gable said. "Because as far as we knew, this man"-Gable

  pointed toward Pittman-"saw our first attempt to kill Jonathan. And

  this man"able pointed harder toward Pittman-"had information that could

  ruin us. One of our security team riding in the escort car noticed a

  taxi following the ambulance. As soon as he reached the estate and told

  me about the taxi, I sent him to locate it before it disappeared from

  the area. The driver's passenger was gone. But the driver could

  identify the passen r because of ,ge a check that the passenger had

  written to cover the expense of the ride. Imagine our concern, Mr.

  Pittman, when we researched your background and discovered that you were

  a reporter. What were we to do? Allow you to write a story about our

  attempt to kill our friend and about the information he revealed to you?

  Certainly not. But we did have another option. Our investigation

  revealed that you'd harassed Jonathan seven years ago, that you were

  currently having an emotional collapse. It wasn't any effort to make it

  seem that you killed Jonathan. We had the check you'd given to the taxi

  driver. We had your fingerprints on the door to Jonathan's room and on

  his life-support equipment. In a twisted personal vendetta, you killed

  Jonathan, then continued with your plans to kill yourself."

  "And when your men caught me, they were going to help me along." Gable

  spread his hands. "Unless the police caught you first, in which case I

  had the resources to arrange for you to commit suicide in jail."

  "You're awfully confident that you can manipulate the system to make it

  do anything you want."

  "I'm a diplomat. I helped design the system. I guarantee that the plan

  would have worked."

  "Then why didn't it?"

  Gable glanced at the floor.

  "Well?" Pittman asked.

  "I congratulate you. You're far more resourceful than your profile led

  me to believe. If you weren't so resourceful, I wouldn't have agreed to

  this conversation, I assure you. For a man determined to commit

  suicide, you have a remarkable talent for survival. "

  "You see, I changed my mind." Gable looked puzzled. "I don't want to

  kill myself any longer. Because of you."

  "Explain.

  "What you did to me made me so afraid that I had to ask myself, If I was

  so eager to die, why was I running? Why not let you do the job for me?

  I rafion by telling myself that I wanted my death to be my idea, riot

  yours. But the truth is, you forced me to reconsider where I was in my

  life. I love

  MYdead son. I miss him desperately. But you distracted me enough that

  I I can accept my grief now rather than fight it."

  Gable studied him as if he had no understanding of the emotions Pittman

  referred to. At last, he sighed. "It would have been so much easier if

  my men had been able to shoot you when you were running from the

  Scarsdale estate.

  Sloane fidgeted. "First Jonathan. Then Anthony. Now Victor. No more.

  I want this settled. I want it stopped."

  "That's why we're here," Gable said. "To settle things."

  Throughout, the man known as Mr. Webley stood against the wall to

  Pittman's right, watching the group, holding Pittman's .45. "For a

  negotiation to be
successful," Gable said, "each side must have

  something to gain. So tell me, Mr. Pittman, what do we gain in

  exchange for the million dollars and the two passports that you gain?"

  "Security. Peace of mind."

  "All very well. Desirable conditions. But vague. How exactly are you

  going to give us security and peace of mind?"

  "By disappearing."

  "Be specific."

  "I'll make it look as if I carried through on my intention to commit

  suicide. I'll do it in such a way that my body can't be identified."

  "Again, be specific."

  "I thought perhaps I'd arrange for your men to trap me on one of your

  yachts. I'd blow it and myself up. My body would never be found.

  Presumably sharks and other scavengers would have eaten what was left of

  me. Of course, I wouldn't actually have been on the yacht. But your

  men, having watched the explosion from another yacht, would testify that

  they'd seen me go aboard. "

  Sloane's voice trembled with enthusiasm. "It might work. "

  "One of my yachts?" Gable squinted. "You imagine expensive ways to

  disappear."

  "Another factor that makes it convincing. Given the magnitude of your

  property loss, the police wouldn't think that you were involved."

  "He has a point," Sloane said quickly.

  Gable scowled at his fellow grand counselor, then redirected his

  calculating gaze at Pittman. "Forgive my colleague's outbursts. He's

  forgotten one of the primary rules of negotiation. Never let your

  opponent know your actual opinion of his argument."

  "I thought we were here to be candid," Pittman said.

  "Then why haven't you yourself been completely open7. You expect me to

  believe that after you pretend to'c omniit suicide you'll disappear

  forever and we'll have nothing to fear from you."

  "that's right," Pittman lied.

  "What guarantees do we have?"

  "I told you. I want to live. I don't want to be hunted anymore. I

  want to be left alone."

  "Under an assumed name."

  "Yes."

  'With Ms. Wan-en.

  "Yes.

  "Perhaps in Mexico. Perhaps farther south. In a country where the

  economy is such that a million dollars is worth considerably more

  "Yes. "

  "And after the barrage of telephone calls last night," Gable asked with

  irritation, "how do you intend to protect us from the other people

  who-thanks to you-have acquired knowledge of our private affairs?"

  "Your daughter, for example?'

  "In particular."

  "Those phone calls were staged to get your attention," Pittman said. "To

  put pressure on you so you'd agree to this meeting. To make you want to

  end this before it spreads any farther. The truth is, your daughter

  doesn't know anything certain. If you agree to my terms, I'll go back

  to her

  From somewhere in the house, a phone rang, the faint sound echoing.

  Pittman glanced past Webley toward the hall as the phone rang a second

  time.

  "It's not important," Gable said. "The fax machine in my home office is

  on a line that's separate from the main telephone line. That's what you

  heard, the fax machine. Two rings and it answered."

  Pittman nodded. "If you agree to my terms, I'll go back to your

  daughter and behave irrationally enough that she'll lose faith in my

  credibility. My apparent suicide will make her even more skeptical

  about me. She'll be forced to conclude that her accusations, based on

  what I told her, are the nonsense you say they are."

  "I like it," Sloane said eagerly. "It makes sense. It can get us out

  of the mess we're in."

  "Winston." Gable's aged eyes flashed. "Your persistent outbursts force

  me to violate protocol. I have never before done this in a negotiations

  But you leave me no choice. I must ask you not to interrupt me again."

  "But-"

  "Winston!" Gable's chest heaved, the effort of emotion having an obvious

  weakening effect on him.

  Sloane looked abashed and lowered his gaze toward his hands.

  Gable's breath rate subsided. He composed himself and studied Pittman,

  frowning. "So you restricted the information that you gave to my

  daughter."

  "That's right." Gable shook his head in disagreement. "I suddenly have

  doubts about you."

  "]:)oubts?"

  "To enlist my daughter's aid, it isn't logical that you would have held

  back. To make your strongest case, you would have told her everything

  you know. I'm beginning to worry that all of this has been needless.

  What exactly do you know? What are we buying? What precisely is worth

  one million dollars and two passports?"

  "Duncan Kline was an instructor at Grollier Academy.".

  Gable raised his bushy white eyebrows and gestured for Pittman to

  continue.

  "He liked to gather the brightest students around him," Pittman said.

  "He persuaded them to join him in small study groups. He nu diem."

  "Of course. Nurturing is something that a good teacher does

  automatically."

  "But good teachers don't molest their students," Pittman said.

  Gable's face became rigid, his wrinkles deepening.

  "Duncan Kline carefully prepared his few chosen students," Pittman said.

  "It took time and devotion, painstaking kindness and delicate

  reassurance. At last he made himself so necessary in their lives, so

  essential to their emotional well-being, that they found themselves

  incapable of resisting his advances. You and the other grand

  counselors, all of you were molested by him. It's affected you ever

  since."

  Gable kept staring, his wrinkled features reminding Pittman of a cnist

  of mud that was cracking.

  "Molested?" Gable asked. "You honestly think I'd go to all this

  trouble to hide the fact that we were molested as students at Grollier?

  Which we were, by the way." Gable raised his face to the beamed ceiling

  and burst out laughing, his feeble Adwn's apple bobbing, his bony throat

  sounding as if gravel were stuck in it. At once he seemed to strangle

  his laughter. In pain, he lowered his face, tugged out his hief, and

  coughed repeatedly into it. His pale face red from effort. The spasms

  slowly subsided. "Of course we were molested. " He swallowed and put

  away his handkerchief. "If you revealed that information, I could

  easily turn it to my advantage, eliciting sympathy from the media. In

  America today, there is no such thing as shame, only prurience and pity.

  You know nothing that threatens me, Mr. Pittman. You're wasting my

  time."

  "You didn't let me finish."

  "Oh? Are you suggesting that you have information of more substance to

  share with us?"

  Pittman's chest ached, swollen with pressure. His heart pumped faster.

  He had hoped that Gable would take for granted that Pittman had

  discovered his secret. An open discussion, in which Gable revealed

  details that he assumed were shared knowledge, had been part of

  Pittman's strategy. What he hadn't counted on was that Gable, the

  lifelong negotiator, wasn't about to acknowledge any information unless

  Pittman volunteered it first.


  Sweat rolled down Pittman's back. Paradoxically cold, the sweat stuck

  his clothes to his skin, making him shiver, although he fought not to

  show it. Okay, he told himself nervously, you came here because you

  felt your best weapon was your ability to interview somebody. Well,

  it's time to prove how good you are. Let's see you interview a

  worldclass negotiator.

  He turned toward the wall-length window, straining to concentrate,

  composing his thoughts. Sunlight gleamed into the room, making him

  squint. Nonetheless, he was able to focus on the fir trees beyond the

  window, amazingly green and clear, preciously beautiful, given his

  proximity to death. At the bottom of the wooded slope beyond the house,

  distant golfers took advantage of the pleasant April day. A man in a

  golf cart drove past a sand trap, toward where his ball had landed near

  the wall that separated Gable's estate from the golf course.

  Pittman stared at the sand trap, and again he couldn't help being aware

  of the bitter irony that a week ago his nightmare had begun near a golf

  course and now was about to end near another one.

  "Mr. Pittman," Gable said, "if you have substantive infor on to share

  with us, do so. Otherwise, I'm afraid that Webley will have to ensure

  that you never share anything w anyone again."