Veil

by George C. Chesbro

  "Parker, you dumb son of a bitch, listen—"

  "You're an idiot, because you think I'm going to eventually back off. You're wrong, buddy. You're going to go right on suffering until you die, or until I get the information I want. I want to know what network you're a part of, the name of your controller, and what specific information you were asked to gather. That's for openers. Later we'll get into more general discussions of KGB operations. You see, Kendry, you really have been wasting my time and your water by trying to bullshit me."

  Veil closed his eyes for a few moments and again tried to focus his thoughts, this time on the question of whom Parker could have talked to. He was afraid he knew the answer; his unknown enemy had found a way to kill him without even coming near the cage or firing a bullet. "What proof?" he asked quietly.

  "Never mind," Parker answered in a somewhat defensive tone. "I've got it."

  "Who told you I was KGB?"

  "How did you find the tunnel?"

  "I just found it. I'd been looking for a way to get in here, and I got lucky."

  "Where have you been hiding since you killed the Mamba?"

  "At the hospice."

  "How'd you get up there?"

  "Pilgrim arranged it. He wants to know what's going on almost as much as I do."

  "Why didn't he come to me?"

  "You'll have to ask him."

  "I'm asking you, jerk."

  "I need water, Parker. I'm losing my voice."

  "No way. You haven't paid for what I gave you before."

  "I don't know why Pilgrim didn't want to talk to you."

  "Take a guess."

  "You know him better than I do, so you must know that he sometimes has funny reasons for doing things. I used to think that I understood his reasons. Now I'm not so sure."

  "Does he know you're over here?"

  "He'll probably guess, but I didn't tell him I was going."

  "Why not?"

  "I'm not sure I trust him any longer."

  "Why."

  "Personality conflict."

  "Well, he can guess all he wants to," Parker said in a low, ominous tone. "By the time I let him in here again, you'll either be dead and buried in the riverbank, or on your way to Washington for some really serious interrogation about your bosses and your network. Your choice."

  "Damn it, Parker, I don't have even one boss, much less a network." Suddenly Veil found himself laughing—a high-pitched, tortured, hiccupping sound that would have sounded more like laughter if he weren't dying of thirst and exposure. "You know, man, you're unbelievably dense, and you're really starting to piss me off. Somebody's pulling your pud, and you're determined to kill off the one man who could help you find out who it is."

  "Pilgrim's a fool," Parker said, more to himself than to Veil. "He'd give away the whole candy store."

  "You're the one with the sucker in the shop, Colonel—not Pilgrim. Think, for chrissake! Did you send that Mamba after me?"

  Parker's silence was eloquent.

  "Of course not," Veil continued. "Do you know who did?"

  Again, Parker's silence was his answer.

  "Now we're getting somewhere," Veil said with a sigh, struggling for breath and against the impulse to gag. Each sound he made now translated itself into pain, but he had to keep talking, had to somehow make Parker listen and understand. "I'll bet you don't even know how your man got up on that mountain; I certainly don't, and neither does Pilgrim. But you do know that he went there and that he was after me. Why—if not for the reasons I'm giving you? He was a double agent, sent by his controller to kill me because the controller thought I was after him. Whoever fed you that shit about me being KGB could be the man I'm after."

  "It doesn't have to be that way," Parker said tightly.

  "What doesn't have to be what way?"

  "Your scenario of what happened."

  "Fine. Tell me what the Mamba was doing on Pilgrim's mountain. Do you think he got lost during a training exercise and stopped by the pool to ask me directions?"

  "He was a double agent, all right, but he was your man."

  "My man?" Veil coughed and tasted blood as his lower lip split in two places.

  "You were his controller."

  "Come on, Parker. Appearances to the contrary, it can't be that easy to seed an agent into your operation here. Once having done so, why should I kill him?"

  "That's one of the things you're going to tell me right now, Kendry. And if you don't, you've had your last drop of water in this lifetime."

  "You're crazy, Parker. How in hell could I be that joker's controller? I've been living in New York for more than fifteen years."

  "Right. The question is what you've been doing in New York."

  "I thought you said you'd checked up on me. I'm a painter; I've been painting, stupid."

  "What else? What did the Russians have you doing in New York? And why should they assign this Mamba to you?"

  Veil choked off a curse and shook his head in frustration. Arguing with Parker was futile, and the fever in his mind and body told him that it was long past time for him to roll out the heavy artillery. "Parker, you fucking idiot, I want you to call a man by the name of Orville Madison. CIA. I don't have the slightest idea where he's posted now, but Langley will have the information. He was my controller. You're DIA, and you should have enough juice to get the Agency to cooperate with you. Madison hates my guts, but I don't think he'll lie to you—assuming he'll talk to you in the first place. Madison will give you the straight story on me, right up to the minute I arrived at the Institute."

  "How would he know?"

  "Because he's had me flagged from the day I was thrown out of the Army and the CIA. I have no doubt that he's bugged every place I've lived in and knows the birthmarks of every person I've met with since then. Madison can probably tell you what I had for breakfast some Sunday morning ten years ago. He'll tell you I'm not KGB. The same person who sent the Mamba after me is trying to kill me now in a different way, by framing me and getting you to kill me."

  "Orville Madison, huh?" For the first time, Parker seemed interested in what Veil had to say.

  "If you can't get to Madison right away, try getting in touch with a man by the name of Lester Bean. Bean may be easier to trace, if you go right to your boss in the Pentagon. Bean was a colonel, and my CO in Vietnam."

  Veil waited, but there was no immediate response from Parker. "Orville Madison—CIA," Veil repeated. "Lester Bean, at one time an officer in the U.S. Army. Call them, Parker. Learn the truth. And then please bring me some water, because I'm really not feeling too well."

  And then Veil passed out.

  Chapter 20

  ______________________________

  Veil dreams.

  Spring. The Greenwich Village Art Show. Surrounded by his oil paintings, he sits in a tattered canvas folding chair on Christopher Street.

  He is terribly thirsty; he is so thirsty that he cannot focus on the potential customers who walk by or occasionally stop to look at his work. Everything seems to be covered with pink gauze, as in fever-vision. He has a pounding headache, and he can think of nothing but water. He is near a number of bars, and he knows where there is a fountain, but he does not bother to rise and go to look for water, for he knows there will be none. Veil knows he is dreaming, and around his dream is a steel cage.

  "You're a dead man, Kendry."

  Veil squints through the haze at Madison, who is emerging from a taxicab. The CIA controller's shoes are covered with steaming, green jungle mud.

  The dream is out of control, Veil thinks, with disparate times, places, people, and things all bleeding into one another. He is dying, and he is both afraid and enraged. He could roll out of the dream, but chooses not to; a waking state will bring him only the worse torment of the cage and the sun.

  "Tell Parker the truth, Madison," Veil says to the man at the curb with the rotting jungle mud on his shoes. "Kill me with a bullet, a knife, or a garrote—not a lie."

>   Footsteps come up behind him, and Parker's voice whispers in his ear. "He can guess all he wants to. By the time I let him in here again, you'll either be dead and buried in the riverbank or—"

  Veil wheels, causing the pink fever-haze to swirl around him, but Parker is gone.

  "I really wish I could get the two of you together," Veil says, and begins to laugh hysterically.

  "He can guess all he wants to," Parker intones from the bottom of a well.

  "Madison, don't kill me with a lie!"

  "You're a dead man, Kendry. I'm going to shoot your ass on the day you find peace or happiness."

  "Orville, old stick!" Veil shouts. "Today isn't that day! I'm really not very happy, so don't let this stupid bastard kill me!"

  I'm losing it, Veil thinks as he suddenly finds himself standing in the middle of Christopher Street with cars passing through him. Thirst, exposure, exhaustion and fear are taking their toll, ripping up his mind.

  There is no place left to escape to.

  "Tell him the truth, Madison. You execute me as you see fit, but please get me out of this cage. I don't want to die like an animal. I don't deserve this."

  Raskolnikov, the White Russian art dealer who will become Veil's mentor, rounds a corner. The portly, bearded man carries an ivory-handled cane in one hand and a chocolate icecream cone in the other. His black patent-leather shoes flash in the sunlight; his footsteps explode on the sidewalk like beats of a snare drum.

  Madison, Po, Sharon, Parker, Pilgrim, and Perry Tompkins are all in the crowd.

  I am dying.

  Raskolnikov glances at Veil's paintings and walks on. He crosses the street at the intersection, steps up on the curb, and stops. He stands still for some time, absently licking his icecream cone as people pass by on either side of him. Then he abruptly tosses his cone into a wire trash container, wheels around, and comes back across the intersection against the light. A car screeches to a halt, narrowly missing him, but Raskolnikov does not even seem to notice.

  "Dead and buried in the riverbank," Parker whispers in Veil's ear.

  Raskolnikov again walks past Veil's paintings, but immediately turns, comes back, and stops in front of them.

  "Call Madison or Bean," Veil whispers. "Please, please. Please. I'm so thirsty."

  "Interesting," Raskolnikov says as he turns toward Veil. "One really has to view your paintings out of the corner of the

  Chapter 21

  ______________________________

  The cold water splashed over his fever-hot body like a tidal wave of torment. Veil's muscles knotted and quivered, but he only had enough strength to lick the water off his cracked lips. He allowed himself to fall sideways, and he sucked at the wet ground. He kept glancing to the side, waiting—praying—for the ladle of water to be offered through the bars. It did not come.

  "Please give me water," Veil said. Or thought he said. He would do anything now for water—beg, make up a story about the Russians and the KGB; but he could not even be sure that he was speaking loud or clear enough to be understood.

  Parker's voice was strangely hollow, as if the man were speaking to him from the opposite end of a large cavern. "You've got balls, Kendry. I'll say that for you. You really are going to manage to kill yourself. Do you think we're idiots?"

  Veil somehow managed to rise to his knees. He clutched at the bars, resting his head against the steel. "Don't . . . understand. Give me water. You've got what you wanted."

  "You're crazy," Parker replied in a tone in which outrage, confusion, and genuine distress vied for control. "You think I want to watch a crazy man kill himself? What the hell did you think you were doing? Did you think you could bluff me? How can a man be dying of thirst, for chrissake, and still find the will to lie?"

  "Don't understand. Call Madison. CIA."

  "The CIA's never heard of you or anyone named Orville Madison."

  "No. Not true. Lie. You didn't talk to the right people, or . . . Madison told them to lie. Call Bean."

  "Bean retired six years ago, and he was killed in an automobile accident three months later. You probably knew that."

  "No. Madison ..."

  "There is no Orville Madison. You pulled the name out of a very dry hat."

  Something was wrong, Veil thought as he struggled to hide from the agony in his mind and body in order to concentrate. There was something in Parker's tone, something in the dream, that told him what was wrong, but he could not pull his thoughts together, could not make the connection. "No," he whispered, feeling lost. "Madison was my controller. Not his style to . . . let this happen. Who did you talk to?"

  There was a long pause. Veil moved his head slightly in order to look up at Parker, but he could see only a blurred image.

  "You're going to die, Kendry," Parker said in a husky voice filled with emotion. "I wouldn't have believed any man could do to himself what you're doing. I wish I could say that I admire your guts, but I don't. You're just stupid. I don't want you to die. Do you understand? I really don't. But I can't let you screw us, either. Don't you understand that I know you're KGB? Kendry, I know you're lying. One thing; just give me one thing and I take you out. Give me the name of your controller."

  "Madison. CIA."

  "Stop it! You're finished, Kendry! No man can endure more than you've endured. Let it go. If I take you out now, give you some water and medical attention, you'll be all right. Another few hours and you'll be finished. Stop telling me lies and give me the name of your Russian controller. It won't take me long to check. I may even give you a long drink right now."

  "You didn't talk to anyone."

  "The name of your controller, Kendry! What specific information did you hope to get here? Give me something, will you? I want to take you out. I don't want to see you die for nothing!"

  "Not you. You didn't make the calls personally. Someone else. Who?"

  "Damn you, Kendry!" Parker shouted. "Damn your eyes! If you think the communists are going to take over the world because you're tougher than we are, you've got a big surprise coming! Fuck you! Die!"

  Veil waited a few moments, then looked up again and squinted. The blurred image was gone. He groaned and licked at the moisture left on the bars of his cage.

  Chapter 22

  ______________________________

  Veil dreams.

  Out of control in mind and body, he speeds down the endless corridor between the swirling gray walls in which figures move and occasionally beckon. He does not try to roll out of the dream, or even slow himself, for there is less agony here.

  There is no agony here.

  In the corridor, speeding toward the electric-blue horizon, there is no thirst or fever-heat or pain. He will not go back, he thinks. Never. He will suffer no more. He will fly along this corridor until he dies, if he is not dead already.

  We're looking for heaven.

  Familiar, disembodied voices call out from the mist on either side of him.

  "He can guess all he wants to. By the time I let him in here again, you'll either be dead and buried in the riverbank or on your way to Washington for more detailed interrogation about your bosses and your network."

  "Ah, but you blew it, dummy," Veil replies in a casual tone that issues from his chest, throat, and mouth as a series of soft chiming notes. "If you're still interested in the truth, give my buddy Orville a little ding-a-ling. But you call him. Don't let anyone else do it for you."

  "You're a dead man, Kendry. I'm going to shoot your ass on the day when you're happy."

  For a few moments, Veil considers remaining silent; he no longer cares about anything but remaining in the state he is in.

  "Good luck, Orville," Veil says at last. "I am at peace here, and I am happy; and there isn't a damn thing you can do about it. Even you can't reach into heaven. Shoot away."

  Chimes suddenly sound. They are outside himself, very loud, and reverberate in the corridor.

  "Madison! Tell Parker the truth! Kill me with a bullet, not a lie!"
<
br />   He does care.

  His speed increases. If he is not dead, Veil thinks, he is certainly now very close to it. He is sorry he has never found the courage to look directly into the walls. He would look now, but he is going too fast; he is at once paralyzed and elongated; he feels as if his body is stretched out for miles behind him, and he cannot turn his head.

  "Stop it! Kendry, I don't want you to die!"

  Chimes. Bong! Bong! Bong!

  "Parker! Hey, dummy, pick up the phone and make the call! Call Madison!"

  His speed increases even more. The moaning, chiming walls flash past in a blur. Veil feels as if his body is coming apart, stretched so thin that there is nothing left but spinning atoms that somehow still carry the electrical charges of emotion and thought.

  Then, suddenly, pain pierces heaven.

  Something sharp, like a snake's fangs, sink into the floating atoms where his right shoulder had been. He wants to grab the wound, but he is stretched too thin. He cannot find his hand.

  "Interesting," Raskolnikov says. "One really has to view your paintings out of the corner of the eye."

  "He can guess all he wants to."

  "You're a dead man, Kendry."

  "Sharon! I love you!"

  "By the time I let him in here again—"

  "Sharon, I'm sorry we didn't have time!"

  We're looking for heaven.

  Venom spurts into the wound, into and around the atoms. There is more pain. His atoms sting, swell, and throb. He can feel the venom, as hot and corrosive as acid, searing his atoms as it moves, seeps through the spaces where his limbs used to be. It is soaking into his space-body, inexorably heading for his brain. His atoms suddenly begin to vibrate in unison, producing low, booming chime sounds that steadily rise in pitch and volume until at last they are beyond hearing.