Through the gate, under the sign, up the incline, past the farmhouse, and I arrived to find my uncle waiting for me on his porch. I took a deep breath to steady my nerves and hopped down from my truck.
“Hi Pete,” Rob greeted me cheerfully. “I’ll take that,” he offered, shouldering my bag. I followed him into his steel-sided barn. He and my dad built the barn on top of a buried refuge – a warren of cargo containers and reinforced concrete. The entry was through the bathroom in the barn. A hydraulic lift lowered the floor of the room down a dozen feet to the top level of the refuge. It was nice not to have to pretend to stay in the trailer. Rob carried my bags into my room.
“Take a load off,” Rob insisted, “and tell me how Thanksgiving dinner went with the Tollivers.”
“Uncle Larry wants me to be his agent to spy on the Civic Circle,” I explained, glad for a good excuse to postpone our confrontation a few more minutes. “He wants me to intern with them, or failing that, with his office in Huntsville that works with them. What I still don’t get is why he’s so interested in recruiting me.”
Rob smiled. “I thought I told you about Xanthos Gambits.”
I vaguely recalled him mentioning it. “That’s when you set up a decision tree so no matter what happens, you can’t lose. You box your opponent into a position where no matter what he does it’s a victory for you.”
“Exactly,” Rob confirmed. “He’s been working on it since last year. Took me some time to figure it all out. The Tollivers have been successful because they all work together to enhance the family’s power, even as they strive with each other for individual dominance. Larry is the eldest brother and head of the family. Mike is his younger rival and at least one of his sons is more or less capable of picking up the reins when the time comes. You tell me, what happens when Larry gets too old and feeble to maintain control? Can you imagine Abby taking over from her father?”
“Hell, no!” The thought was preposterous. Abby was a shallow, arrogant, stuck-up piece of work.
“Can you imagine her marrying someone who could take over Tolliver Corporation?”
My initial reaction was also “hell no,” but I considered the question more carefully. “I suppose it’s possible that some ambitious young man might decide to put up with her and vice versa.”
“From all you’ve told me, she’s enough of a pain in the ass that only someone marrying up would want anything to do with her. The kind of young man with the skill and talent to grow into leading a company like Tolliver Corporation would have far better options than Abby. In the off chance she does find a suitable mate by her father’s standards, Larry’s son-in-law is unlikely to put up with Abby for long. It will be difficult to truly bring him into the family. The situation is unstable. Even if Larry tried to go that route, enough of the cousins would see the danger for what it was and forbid his son-in-law from exercising real power. So what happens when Larry loses his grip on the company?
“Mike takes over and grooms his son as heir apparent,” I concluded.
“Exactly, unless Larry has an ace hidden up his sleeve.” Rob looked into my eyes. “You.”
“I’m not sure I see,” I acknowledged.
“The worst-case scenario is for whatever reason you don’t work out for him. Then, Larry finds a way to publically disgrace and humiliate you for your pretension in thinking you could mingle with your Tolliver superiors. By crushing you, he shows his strength and ingratiates himself to the Tolliver cousins who still haven’t forgiven your father for eloping with a Tolliver heiress. If Larry gets enough of the family to support him, he may be able to hold off Mike and groom some safer, more distant family member as his successor. That’s the worst case, but it’s a win for him.
“More likely, you do work out. Maybe you’ll be his inside man in the Civic Circle, maybe his catspaw within Tolliver Corporation – just one more distant cousin of the family. However capable you might be, with all the animosity toward your father, you won’t get anywhere in the Tolliver hierarchy without your uncle’s patronage. That gives him a degree of control over you that he wouldn’t necessarily have over one of the other cousins. By the time anyone realizes you might be Larry’s ally, you’ll be too closely tied to him for any other faction to secure your loyalty.
“That’s exactly why he’s talking about having you intern at the Huntsville, Alabama, office instead of closer to home,” Rob pointed out. “He has someone whisper into HR’s ear, and you’re hired. It’s unlikely anyone learns of your connection to him or his patronage because of the distance from the home office. If they do learn of Larry’s influence, you’ve been exiled to the corporate Siberia, so it looks like some scheme Larry’s inflicting on you. He has complete deniability.
“Eventually, he’ll be able to place you in the Tolliver hierarchy as his ally, where you are the greatest use to him. You might even succeed him as President of Tolliver Corporation if he has no other safer candidate groomed for the job. You’d be nominally in charge, but he’d be pulling your strings from behind the scenes. No one would expect you to be in cahoots with Larry. When Larry’s ready to disclose the connection, it scores points for him for being so magnanimous.”
I shook my head in disgust. “I can’t believe how ridiculously complicated these dynastic politics can get.”
“Larry’s counting on that,” Rob said with a smile. “The word is ‘internecine’ – an ugly struggle within a group for power and control. You’ll need his help to figure out who’s on whose side. That makes you dependent on him. Unless of course you figure out the game and how it’s played first.”
Rob was being so helpful and so… enlightening. It made my coming confrontation with him that much more difficult to start.
“How’s school been treating you?” Rob leapt in, before I could take charge of the conversation and steer it toward the Tolliver Library fire.
“It’s been a wild ride.” I told him about the zero I got from Professor Muldoon and was gratified at the extent of his righteous anger and the grin on his face when I described the outcome of the hearing. I also described the Introduction to Social Justice class – the essays we were required to do tying oppression into various topics around “justice” and “equality” and “oppression.”
Rob was shaking his head in disgust. “That’s a classic brainwashing technique,” he explained.
“Brainwashing?”
“During the Korean War,” Rob explained, “prisoners were subjected to indoctrination classes, just like what you describe. The camps employed a variety of persuasion techniques to try to convert prisoners to communist ideology.
“All persuasion, whether for good or evil, relies on similar principles. I’ll run down the list, and you tell me. Reciprocity?”
That one was obvious. “The Social Justice Initiative is paying for my education.”
“You have a natural desire to want to return the favor,” Rob acknowledged. “There’s commitment and consistency….”
“My fellow students and I accepted the mantle of being social justice ambassadors, so we’ll have a natural tendency to act and think consistent with that original commitment.”
Rob nodded. “What about social proof?” He continued when I gave him a blank stare. “You already told me all your fellow students are writing the same kind of essays and reading them aloud to each other. It’s easier to go along with the crowd than to try to buck the consensus.”
I’d already figured that out, just hadn’t had a name for the phenomenon.
“Authority?” Rob asked.
“I think these terms are loaded with additional connotations for you,” I pointed out. “You mean does Professor Gomulka speak as an authority?” I continued when he nodded confirmation. “Of course, he’s a professor and we’re merely students.”
“Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion, by Robert B. Cialdini,” Rob explained, revealing his source at last. “It’s on your reading list.” He’d given me a long list of books to read and I hadn’t
gotten to that one yet. I was coming to the realization that understanding psychology was just as important as military tactics and strategy. “Your professor speaks from a position of authority and his opinions carry extra weight because of it. When in doubt, people will tend to defer to an authority figure. There’s… two more,” he said looking up and away into space and counting on his fingers.
“There’s liking – from what you say he’s quite a likeable sort. He’s providing positive feedback and boosting your egos whenever you identify yourself as victims of oppression. And there’s scarcity – he’s made clear that his class is the only source of the revealed wisdom he’s providing, that his students are part of an elite few who truly understand what’s really going on. There’s a natural tendency to value something that is scarce or hard to get. That’s part of why hazing is such an effective recruiting tool – the more arduous it is to get into a group, the more highly members value their membership.”
There he went again, being helpful. In most every interaction I had with him, he effortlessly became the teacher, the mentor, and reminded me of how much I had to learn as the lowly student apprentice. I had to force the confrontation before he had me too demoralized to go after him. “I need some advice.”
“Sure thing,” he offered. “What’s the problem?”
“You know how we’ve been speculating for the past year now what organization might have burned down the library?” I began.
It was subtle, but I knew my uncle well enough to detect the understated signs of wariness in his face. “Yes,” he replied.
“I figured out who did it,” I said confidently. “And I’ve opened a dialogue with the responsible group regarding future joint actions.”
“I thought we’d agreed,” Rob responded in an unnaturally level tone, “that you would not take action without my permission.”
“Circumstances arose,” I explained, “and I seized the opportunity for a conversation. I thought it would be helpful to better understand their capabilities and motivations, and whether they could be trusted.”
“I see,” he said, neutrally. He stared, prodding me to break the growing silence with further disclosure. He’d already taught me that trick, though. It wasn’t going to work. Finally, he relented, a hint of a smile in the wrinkles by his eyes. “Were you going to tell me anything else?”
“No,” I replied. “Need to know. The more people who know the details, the less secure the secret.”
“Why did you tell me in the first place, then?” he asked.
“I know how much effort I spent trying to track down this information. I’d hate to see you waste your valuable time continuing to pursue the matter,” I explained, “when I know who was responsible for the library fire. Don’t you agree that’s the correct course of action?” I was wondering what he’d do when I backed him into that corner.
“Maybe,” he said. “Maybe not. It depends on how much confidence you have in my ability to handle the information in a responsible manner,” he explained. “Speaking strictly hypothetically, of course,” he added, “if I were the sort to waste my comrade’s time with overly-clever schemes trying to expose an imagined hypocrisy, you might be better off keeping me completely in the dark and letting me spin my wheels rather than turning me loose where I might do more harm.”
The bastard. He knew. He knew I knew. Now, he was just toying with me.
“Very well,” I said. “You prefer directness. I’ll be direct. You burned the Tolliver Library down using liquid oxygen as your accelerant, didn’t you?”
“Technically, it’s an oxidizer, not an accelerant,” he clarified, “but yes, I did.”
“You led me to believe it was some mysterious third party, so I was filtering or parsing all the data available under the false assumption you left with me.”
I’d expected equivocation. Instead, he looked said, “Yes, I did,” calmly, looking me in the eye, daring me to call him on it.
Challenge accepted. “You lied to me,” I said, doing my best to control the anger growing inside me.
“I kept you in the dark,” Rob acknowledged. “I protected you. Would you like to know why?”
“Of course,” I answered.
“Do you remember when I picked you up from your parents last Thanksgiving?” Rob asked.
“Yes.” It was the last time I saw them. It suddenly struck me: I’d just completed my first year without my parents, but I had to suppress the rising wave of grief and anger and focus on what Uncle Rob was saying.
“Your father gave me a simple charge: ‘Keep my son safe.’ I knew there were risks, but I thought I was ready to manage them. Then, you told me all you’d learned about the Civic Circle. The likelihood that the Civic Circle was mixed up in this Heaviside secret vastly increased the potential capabilities and the likely danger of our enemies. My risk assessment went from dangerous to critical. I couldn’t believe your folks were just waltzing off at a time like that. Remember how I left the next morning?”
“Yes.” I’d been working on scholarship essays.
“I left to go persuade your father to grab Kira and bring her back here with your mom so they’d all be safe,” Uncle Rob explained. “Your father was headstrong. He’d been planning this second honeymoon with your mom for months. He was convinced the government couldn’t do anything over a federal holiday weekend – not an unreasonable assumption under most circumstances, actually. He refused to cancel his trip. Still, he agreed on a contingency I offered. I arranged a safe house with a Nashville friend, and I spent most of the rest of the day figuring out how to smuggle us all into Mexico, if need be.”
I had no idea Uncle Rob had been doing all that behind the scenes.
“On Saturday, Amit found that the Circle was moving against your parents and Jim Burleson. He brought over the list of books their Technology Containment Team wanted to seize. I warned your folks to get to the safe house, but it was too late for Jim. We snuck into the library and you and Amit set up your equipment and started scanning the books while I checked the perimeter. The idea was to scan the books and get away with none the wiser.”
“But, you changed the plan once we got to the library,” I said. “Why?”
“I saw the light from the study room you were using the moment I got to the top of the stairs and surveyed the third floor of the library. You and Amit ought to have known better than to set up your scanning operation in line-of-sight of the stairs. I was wondering if I should have you break down and move to a place with better concealment when I cleared the door and saw what you were doing.” Uncle Rob’s voice was turning distinctly grim.
“Your gloves were off,” he said.
“They were too awkward to handle the pages of the books,” I explained defensively.
“You didn’t think to bring rubber gloves?” Uncle Rob asked. “You and Amit were leaving your fingerprints all over books that were about to be confiscated by the Circle’s Technology Containment Team. I could guarantee you: the very first thing they would do was a forensic analysis to try to figure out who might have handled the books, and you boys… you were leaving your fucking fingerprints over everything.”
Amit and I hadn’t even thought about that. He was right. We should have.
“I asked you what was going on,” Uncle Rob continued, “and you offered me goddamn snacks, spraying crumbs, spittle, and DNA all over the place, like a little puppy dog wagging his tail in front of a steaming pile of dog shit.”
Ouch. That was both brutal and true. My uncle wasn’t done dissecting our performance yet, however.
“I was furious. I was about to rip into you both, but I caught myself. I realized the problem was not with you and Amit, but with me. Your father had convinced me you two were super-competent. Perhaps you were in your own way, but not in the way I was assuming. I’d figured I was dealing with operators: skilled men who know my craft, who understand basic principles of stealth and infiltration. I was wrong – dead wrong. You were boys. Clever boys, yes
, but utterly clueless about what a competent adversary would do with all the evidence you were unwittingly leaving behind. If I chewed you out, I’d only make matters worse. A couple of jittery and flustered teammates wouldn’t do. Scanning was a no go. The only way out of that monumental goat rope was to collect all the books and sanitize the room to destroy any traces of DNA evidence. The Circle would know someone grabbed the books, but you’d screwed things up so badly, it couldn’t be helped. The books couldn’t be left behind to incriminate you boys. I figured I had to get you out of there with the books and clean the place up. I figured I could shoo you on out of there, then find some bleach and take care of it. In a janitor’s closet, maybe.”
“That’s when you told us to take the books and go,” I said.
“Right. I made up an excuse about the sheriff coming, told you that we didn’t have time, and we’d have to take the books on the list. There were dozens of them, but the three of us could carry them away, no problem. You started to gather your things, when I had a sickening realization. You two had spent your whole summer scanning books. I asked, and you confirmed the total was at least several hundred all throughout the library. No way could we clean them all out and carry them back through the steam tunnels in a reasonable amount of time. Every one of those books was a clue leading straight back to you and Amit.
“We had harvested the kernels of truth, but your fingerprints and DNA remained, strewn throughout a library full of books. We had gathered the wheat, but the chaff remained. This wasn’t a mess I could clean up with a bottle of bleach. There was only one way to destroy that vast pile of evidence and save your lives.”
A Rambling Wreck: Book 2 of The Hidden Truth Page 12