Gilda had to give her team credit; they really did know how to work the surveillance equipment.
“They’re actually doing pretty well,” April whispered in Gilda’s ear. “They’re tracking her better than the other teams did. I’m going to run to the ladies’ room; looks like you have everything under control here.”
Gilda’s spy recruits had just managed to close in on Agent Topaz and were turning up their dials in an attempt to get an audio reading when every screen in the room went black.
“Hey!” James Bond shouted. “Who turned out the lights?”
“Probably just a power outage,” Gilda suggested. “Real spies have to deal with unexpected technical problems all the time.”
“I don’t think it’s a power outage,” said The Misanthrope. “The overhead lights are still working.”
Gilda was just about to fetch Roger for help when every video screen filled with grainy gray and black dots. Gilda’s left ear tickled. She felt a prickly sensation all over her skin as a staticky electrical roar filled the room.
“Hey! The video is coming back!”
Everyone waited for the image of a hotel interior to re-emerge on their screens, but instead, the screens only blurred with more black dots that moved faster and faster, clustering together in what seemed an attempt to form an image.
“I bet this never happens when you have a solar-powered system,” said Stargirl.
“Cool!”
“Weird! What’s going on, Case Officer Zelda?”
The temperature in the room plummeted. Gilda shivered, sensing a presence that was gathering energy—struggling to gain enough strength to reveal itself. Then, with the unexpected immediacy of a flash of lightning, a face peered from every screen.
Baby Boy screamed.
“Omigod!” squealed Stargirl.
The other kids fell silent, transfixed by the face’s sightless, open eyes. Dark makeup smudged the eyes and black-red blood trickled from a wound on the woman’s head.
It was the face of a dead woman. Upon the woman’s throat was a brooch in the shape of a star. Gilda had the disturbing feeling that she recognized the face. The recognition was particularly upsetting because there was only one place she had ever seen this woman.
It’s her, she thought. It’s the face from my dream.
After recovering from their shock, Gilda’s spy recruits seemed to decide that the face on their video screens must be part of the surveillance test—something intentionally created by the Spy Museum to scare them.
“Like I said before, I bet a rat agent from another spy team is sabotaging our surveillance equipment,” The Misanthrope suggested.
“That’s a good theory,” said Gilda. “We’d better all keep our eyes open for double agents.” The truth is that he just saw a ghost, she thought.
Deciding that everyone needed to recover from the surveillance activity and hoping to learn more about the events of the morning, Gilda sent her team on a bathroom break and told them to meet her back in the Ultra Room for lunch.
It’s very weird that at the moment, I’m acting as an adult who’s concealing true information from kids. It’s ironic because I HATE it when adults do that. On the other hand, I now understand something: I think so-called grown-ups hide or even lie about the truth when they don’t have a clue what to say about it to kids. They’re scared and confused and don’t know how to explain what’s going on, so they don’t say anything. For example, if the grown-up in charge (me) doesn’t know exactly who or what that face on the video screens was that we all saw, how are the kids supposed to feel safe? Hence, not talking about it at all and hoping they’ll forget they ever saw it.
Deciding that everyone needed to recover from the surveillance activity and hoping to learn more about the events of the morning, Gilda sent her team on a bathroom break and told them to meet her back in the Ultra Room for lunch.
With a couple minutes to spare before lunchtime, Gilda decided to take the opportunity to look for Roger in his office.
Roger worked on a laptop computer, but most of his workspace resembled a utility closet.
Gilda opened the door to find Roger sitting in a chair with his eyes closed as if he had dozed off without realizing it. “Oh! Sorry.”
Roger rubbed his eyes. “Was I asleep?”
“Maybe just for a minute.”
“Don’t tell April. She’s loves that I’m experiencing this whole colicky baby thing on top of everything else going on here. She thinks it’s hilarious. ‘See, Roger? Now you know how I felt a couple years ago.’” Roger took off his baseball cap, rubbed the top of his head as if this might help wake him up, and reapplied the baseball cap. “To be honest,” he said, “I’m still kind of spooked out by that stuff in the audio room.”
“Good thing you weren’t in the video room a few minutes ago.”
“What happened?”
Gilda explained what she and her spy recruits had just seen—the woman’s face that had suddenly peered at them through the video screens.
“I’ve seen a lot of technical problems, but this is definitely the weirdest. I even started to wonder whether someone might be tampering with the equipment or the software in the control room. I asked the security staff to check out the museum’s surveillance cameras but we couldn’t find anything that looked suspicious.”
“Roger, I think we’re dealing with a haunting.” Gilda watched Roger carefully to gauge his reaction.
He looked doubtful. “I know there are supposed to be a lot of ghosts around D.C., but that seems far-fetched. Why the Spy Museum?”
“Why not the Spy Museum? Ghosts gravitate to places or objects they used during their lives, and this place is full of old objects with tons of history. Plus, ghosts often turn up more often when people die amid intense emotions or unfinished business.”
“There’s plenty of unfinished business around here; that’s for sure.”
“Exactly. This place is just filled with stories of intrigue and betrayal, not to mention all the spies who got killed before they finished whatever they had set out to do. Maybe one of them wants us to know something about her.”
“Maybe.” Roger’s face clouded as if he were angry with the ghost for interfering with the exhibits he had so carefully designed.
“Has anything like this happened before?”
“No.” Roger thought for a moment. “Well—there was one thing. When I placed that new gold lipstick pistol and the star brooch in the Sisterhood of Spies exhibit, I saw something strange in the mirror where that film about female spies plays.”
At the mention of the lipstick pistol and star brooch, Gilda’s ears perked up. She pulled out her reporter’s notebook to take notes. “Tell me more,” she said. “Tell me exactly what you saw.”
“It was like the regular film stopped, and this weird smoky thing appeared. . . . It kind of looked like a person, but I wasn’t sure what it was. All I knew was that it was looking at me—and I wanted to get away.” He picked up a screwdriver and began flipping and catching it in one hand nervously. “I made myself forget about it because I couldn’t find any way to explain it. When I checked the equipment, I couldn’t find a single thing to explain what happened.”
“Was that the first time you experienced this kind of strange event in the museum?”
“I think so.”
Gilda nodded. “That backs up my theory.”
“What theory?”
“I think this is all connected with the new artifacts we acquired from Boris Volkov; I just have to figure out exactly how.”
TO: Gilda Joyce
FROM: Gilda Joyce
RE: SPY MUSEUM HAUNTING INVESTIGATION--UPDATE
HYPOTHESIS: The Spy Museum may be haunted by the ghost of a female spy who has some connection with the artifacts acquired from Boris Volkov. The camera-concealing star-shaped brooch seems particularly significant. Images of blood and death are linked with this ghost; maybe she was a KGB officer who was murdered?
QUESTIONS TO INVESTIGATE:
1. WHAT DOES THE SPY MUSEUM GHOST WANT TO TELL ME? I need to find out more about the ghost’s identity and how (if at all) she’s linked with the lipstick gun and camera-concealing brooch. Find a way to interrogate Boris Volkov. (This might prove difficult.)
2. WHAT DO THE FOLLOWING PHRASES MEAN, AND WHAT IS THEIR SIGNIFICANCE TO THE SPY MUSEUM GHOST?“The Last Meeting”
“The poet knows”
“The truth lives forever”
3. In my dreams, the Spy Museum ghost, Lincoln’s ghost, and clues pointing to Oak Hill Cemetery are linked together. ARE THESE CLUES ALL RELATED, OR AM I REALLY PURSUING TWO SEPARATE INVESTIGATIONS? HOW ARE ALL THESE EERIE IMAGES AND MESSAGES CONNECTED?
21
Two Truths and a Lie
Dear Wendy,
BIG development: there’s a ghost in the Spy Museum who’s turning up in audio and video exhibits. Meanwhile, I’ve got a situation that potentially involves a national security issue and the ghost of President Lincoln. I can’t go into the details yet, but I’m planning to go to the Library of Congress after work today to do some research that should help me decipher a code.
If all of that isn’t enough: at this very moment, I’m sitting here watching my spy recruits play yet another lively game of “wigball.” (That’s right—wigball. The kids use the museum’s spy wigs and false noses as balls and water bottles as bats.)
ME: (watching a wig sail through the air, nearly colliding with my boss’s head) Hey, you guys! That’s enough.
KIDS: But we’re just playing wigball. Can’t we just finish this game?
It’s weird when you find yourself on the receiving end of the same excuses you’ve used all your life. How many times has my mom said to me, “Gilda, turn off Saved by the Bell; it’s time for dinner now.” My response: “But I just want to see what happens next” (even though I’ve seen the rerun about twelve times already). Well, now I’m in the position of being the authority figure, and at the moment, the kids aren’t listening to me. Maybe I need to get one of those annoying whistles that our playground supervisors wore around their necks when we were in elementary school. Now wigs are sailing through the room, whizzing past the other teams’ tables. Uh-oh-I think I just saw one of them land on April Shepherd’s head. She’s giving me a warning look. Okay-I’ve got to do something about this. I’ll write more later!
“Come over here, guys!” Gilda did her best to entice her recruits away from their rowdy game of wigball. “I have a really cool spy game to teach you!”
“What is it?” asked James Bond as he tossed a blond wig in the air and used a soda bottle to whack it across the room.
“It can’t be more fun than this game of wigball,” said Stargirl, deftly catching the wig.
Gilda did her best to think fast. “You’re going to practice telling lies.”
This got her recruits’ attention: for a moment they looked both intrigued and stunned.
“But lying is wrong,” said Baby Boy.
“That’s right, Baby Boy,” said Gilda. “Lying is wrong.”
“My code name isn’t Baby Boy; it’s Spider-Man.”
“Lying is wrong,” Gilda continued, “but spies have to do it all the time. What do you think you’re doing when you put on a disguise and use a fake passport and let someone believe that your cover story is your authentic identity? You’re essentially telling a lie in order to do your job as a spy. If you’re a good spy, you’re lying as a means to an end: in order to get important information that will help protect others from danger. But of course, you will be trying to get information from people who might be lying to you as well. For example, you have to watch out for double agents. If you want to be a spy, you have to get good at sensing when other people are lying to you.”
“I can tell when people are lying,” said Stargirl. “They get really twitchy and ner vous.”
“Lots of people do,” said Gilda. “But some people don’t. In fact, I once knew a girl who kept herself incredibly still while she was lying. She was pretty, popular, liked by everyone. And she made perfect eye contact and practically stopped blinking while she was lying through her teeth to the teachers and the school principal denying her involvement in a criminal activity. The only way you can catch people like her lying is when they slip up at some point in telling their story. That’s why, if you’re interrogating someone, you have to keep asking the same question lots of different ways.”
“And if you’re the one making up a cover story and a legend, you’d better know your own story really well,” said James Bond.
“Exactly. Which leads us to a little game we’re going to play: it’s called Two Truths and a Lie.”
“Oh, I think I’ve played that before at a slumber party,” said Stargirl. “It’s like we all say three things about ourselves: two things that are true and one thing that’s a lie. Then we all see if we can guess which is which.”
“That actually sums it up pretty well, Stargirl.”
“Oh! Can I go first?” The Comedian asked.
“Go ahead.”
“Okay—here goes. Number one: I’ve won seventeen karate tournaments.”
The Comedian ignored the giggles and broad grins that followed this statement. He was well aware his plump physique made it hard to imagine him pursuing any sport quite so seriously.
“Number two: once I was standing in a bakery, and a car crashed through a wall. I was saved by a display of chocolate croissants that stopped the car before it could crash into me.”
“What are croissants?” Baby Boy asked.
“Pastries,” said The Misanthrope. “Kind of like flaky bread. And not something you usually see blocking a car crash.”
“A car crashed into bread?”
“In other words, that was a lie,” said James Bond.
“Are you sure?” said The Comedian. “Number three: I’m twelve years old.”
“If you subtract six years of mental age,” said James Bond.
“Hey, I think he told two lies instead of two truths,” said The Misanthrope. “No offense, but I don’t believe he’s a karate champion, and I definitely don’t believe he was saved from a car crash by croissants.”
“Doughnuts, maybe,” quipped James Bond, “but not croissants. Too fancy.”
“Yeah, eet sounded like a movie,” said Agent Moscow. “Kind of hard to believe.”
Gilda smiled, feeling certain she knew which statement was the lie. “Do you want to tell everyone the lie?”
“I’m actually eleven years old,” said the Comedian, clearly pleased with himself. “That was the lie.”
“I knew it!” Gilda blurted.
“You knew his age because you’ve seen our records,” said The Misanthrope.
“No, I suspected he was lying because ‘I’m twelve years old’ was the most boring thing he’s said since he got here. It wasn’t in character.”
“It’s like that saying,” said Stargirl, “truth is stranger than fiction.”
“Exactly. Have any of you ever told the truth to someone who assumed you were lying simply because your story sounded too odd or unexpected?”
Gilda’s recruits all nodded.
“A lot of people prefer hearing lies,” said The Misanthrope.
“What are you talking about?” Stargirl frowned. “I don’t know anyone who prefers lies.”
“I sure do,” said The Misanthrope.
“Like who?” James Bond asked.
“A lot of people.” The Misanthrope shrugged. “People at my school who shoplift even though they’re rich but would never admit it. People who are considered smart and popular but who cheat on every test. Their parents know they do it but they pretend not to know because they want them to get into college someday. My mom, who tells everyone she has ‘the perfect family’ and does her best to fit in with that whole group of phonies.” His voice rose at the end, and Gilda got the feeling he might have burst into tears if he had been alone.
T
he group fell silent, momentarily unnerved by the harsh honesty of his words. Sitting on the floor, The Misanthrope played with one of the shoelaces on his sneakers. “I guess, with a lot of people I know, when you tell them something they don’t want to hear, it’s like they become deaf.”
Okay—now’s the time I need some mature words of wisdom to put this all in perspective as their camp counselor, Gilda thought, wondering how they had veered from the topic of spy tradecraft into something that suddenly felt more like a group-therapy session. Maybe this is what happens in the intelligence community when spies have to work under pressure and nobody in the “outside world” can know what’s really going on with them. Do they confide in one another, or do they just become distrustful of everyone?
“Eet can feel lonely when you can tell nobody what ees really going on,” said Agent Moscow quietly.
The Misanthrope glanced up at Agent Moscow with appreciation but quickly went back to staring at his shoelaces as if hoping they would come to his protection in some way.
“What do you mean, Agent Moscow?” Gilda asked, feeling very curious about Agent Moscow and also relieved that one of the kids had at least attempted to offer a helpful response to The Misanthrope’s confession.
“My parents—I don’t tiell dem much because dey are so far away in Russia. Dey can do nothing to hielp when something goes wrong, and I don’t want to worry dem. Sometimes I lie. Or I just don’t tiell everyting—and dat is lonely sometimes.”
Gilda had to admit she could relate to some of the feelings her team members described: she had felt vaguely lonely ever since she arrived in the nation’s capital. While she was too busy with work and her investigation to dwell on the feeling, the truth was that trying to solve a complicated mystery while living far from anyone who knew her well was harder than she had expected.
“Feeling lonely or even kind of alienated is common for spies,” said Gilda, thinking that she should try to direct the discussion back to the subject of espionage. “Think about it: imagine you’re an intelligence officer based in a foreign country, and you’ve assumed a false identity. If you’re able to make some friends in the local community, they won’t know who you really are: they’ll only know invented facts about you—your made-up ‘legend.’ When you’re having a hard time getting secret information, you won’t be able to call your best friend from high school and complain because your work will be secret from everyone except a very small circle of spies—maybe one or two family members. Hopefully, you’ll know that you’re doing important work, but most of the time, you’ll be the only person who will know what’s going on in your life.” Now that I think of it, Gilda thought, simply being lonely is one of the risks of being a spy that the Spy Museum movie didn’t mention.
The Dead Drop Page 12