One morning, while Vanessa was sleeping, he had taken the car he now used but rarely and had driven fifty miles to a town he had never before visited in his life. There he had bought a great quantity of artists’ materials: canvas, oil paints, brushes, palette knives, an easel, sketch blocks, charcoal sticks, pastel colours and several books on advanced techniques. He had also bought a sheepskin jacket, shirts, trousers and country shoes for Vanessa—but nothing feminine.
When he returned to his cottage, he took the clothes that Vanessa had arrived in and burned them. Then he began to turn one room of the house into a typical studio. While Vanessa watched in wonder, he deliberately spilled paints and turpentine on to the carpet and trod the colours in. Then he drank some whisky and sloshed quantities of colour on to a large piece of canvas board propped on the studio easel. Somehow, he managed to work the colour with a palette knife so that the final effect was of a primitive landscape, full of violence and mystery. The effect was pleasing or, at least, startling. He regarded it with pleasure. Then he daubed a ragged black line through it, flung the canvas board to one side, and started something else.
While he worked, he invented his past. He had a keen ear for accents and an ability to emulate them. Roland Badel had been born in the south of England, had a cultivated accent and a university education. But Roland Badel was to be put into suspended animation. Oliver Anderson was a northerner, coming from a poor family, and poorly educated. His parents had separated when he was quite young; and, though he had lived with his mother for a time, he had run away from home when he was sixteen. He had drifted for a time, working as a casual labourer for the money he needed to keep from starving. He had washed dishes in restaurants, helped build the monorail tracks that connected London with its four airports, mowed lawns for old ladies, worked as a roughneck on North Sea drilling rigs, picked apples in Devonshire orchards.
All these activities were things that a stranger called Dr. Roland Badel knew about intimately. His patients had told him. Therefore Oliver Anderson could create a past that was not too difficult for him to absorb.
When he was about twenty, he met a tramp who had a fantastic talent for painting. In a couple of hours, with the right materials, he could produce a Picasso, or a Modigliani, or a Klee, or a Van Gogh, or a Pollock that would confound the experts. (Dr. Badel, late psychologist, had encountered such a person who had served ten years for art forgeries). It was from this tramp that Oliver Anderson learned to appreciate the magic of colour, the occult beauty of line.
As he tackled another canvas and talked to the amazed girl who sat watching him, Badel found himself slipping into his new role easily. The northern accent with its short a and its lost h seemed to come quite naturally. He found that he enjoyed painting. Perhaps he should have been a painter, a real one…
“What’s me name, love?”
“Oliver.” The response was now automatic.
“Oliver what, you girt bitch?”
“Oliver Anderson.”
“Where did I meet you?”
“London. I was mainlining. You got me off it.”
“That’s right. I got you off it for the screws, you understand. Nothing personal.”
“Yes, Oliver, you got me off it for the screws.” To Vanessa, it was still an unreal game. “Am I good enough in bed then?”
He looked at her calmly. “I’ve had better, and I’ve had worse. You’ll do for the time being.”
Vanessa laughed. He hit her.
“Put on some music, you stupid child. Play anything that will block you. Understand?”
Tears trickled down her face, Vanessa nodded dumbly. She selected the 1812 once more. The cannons seemed to be shooting straight at her.
He came and held her close. “Listen, little one. The charade is for real. We are trying to ensure that they cannot trace you through me. You don’t know where you are, but you do know who you are with. Let them steal that information while you are sleeping, relaxed, unguarded, and the air will be black with Security choppers… Who am I?”
“Oliver Anderson.” She wiped away the tears and smiled. “Probably the worst painter in the United Kingdom.”
“Misunderstood,” he said, in his best northern accent, “just misunderstood. I’m ahead of my time, love. Not to worry. Posterity will accord me the honour that is due.”
“I love you,” said Vanessa, as the cannon crashed loud. “You really care about me. You are the first adult to really care about me. I love you.”
He kissed her. “Darling Vanessa, I love you also, as you well know. But try to remember that you are supposed to be here just for the screws. Unless you can be sure of your blocks—and you can’t—you must think of me as a rather crude middle-aged failure still thinking he can make the big time, as they say in stone-age movies. I’m good for a bed and food and a few hand-outs, but not much else. You are simply using me and waiting until you can steal enough money to get across to France, or Germany or Denmark. If you are as good as I think you are, the people who are trying to trace you will be utterly ruthless. They will stop at nothing to get you back or take you out. It will help if they think you are planning to leave the country.”
“Take me out?” Vanessa did not understand.
“It means kill, love. Very probably, if they think you could be an embarrassment, they will try to kill you.”
She was amazed. “Why should anyone want to kill me?”
He sighed. “Until you came along, I didn’t want to have anything to do with the rest of the world. As you know, I have no tri-di, no V-phone. I have taped music and a transistor radio that I never used. But, since you came, I began to listen to the newscasts. There was a Parliamentary Question about you, Vanessa. Sir Joseph Humboldt didn’t like it. He was of the implied opinion that you don’t exist. There will be few people who want to prove him wrong, and a number of highly trained specialists who will be well paid to prove him right. Do I make myself clear?”
Vanessa shuddered. “I’m frightened. I’m so frightened. I didn’t realise that—“
The 1812 came to an end.
Oliver Anderson said: “Don’t worry, love. Oliver will take care of you. Just open your legs at the right time, and strike a few quasi-erotic poses as required, and you’ve got it made.”
Vanessa gazed at him, and forced herself to see only a middle-aged fourth-rate painter.
Many miles away, Dugal Nemo received her impression and reported it.
Farther away still, so did Quasimodo.
11
DENZIL INGRAM SAT nursing the gin and tonic that Simon Pargetter had just poured for him. Jenny, sitting opposite him, also with a gin and tonic, tried to appear calm and detached, but could not disguise her anxiety. Her eyes were bright—too bright—and she could not keep still.
Ingram’s trained mind came up with the answer: drugs or, just possibly, prescribed sedatives and emotional trauma. She knew something. If she didn’t tell it, she would have to be probed. Normally, Ingram would have left this kind of follow-up to a junior; but the stakes had suddenly become high.
The Opposition seemed to think they had a sporting chance of using the case of Vanessa Smith to force a defeat on the Security of the State Bill. If that happened, the Prime Minister could fall. He had not yet mustered quite enough backing to assume dictatorial powers. Sir Joseph Humboldt, the prospect of absolute power almost within his grasp, was not a man to prevaricate. The word had come down that if Ingram could take out Vanessa before the Opposition got a line on her, he would be well rewarded—a knighthood possibly, financial benefits certainly, also the prospect of advancement even, perhaps, to Security Control. If, on the other hand, he failed, he could only expect total professional disaster.
So Denzil Ingram was delegating as little as possible of the investigation to other hands.
“Mrs. Pargetter,” he said, “I really am sorry to have to trouble you. But it is important. Do you have any knowledge of the whereabouts of your daughter?”
She
drank her gin and tonic in one. “She doesn’t exist,” said Jenny in a shrill voice. “According to Sir Joseph Humboldt, there is no such person as Vanessa Smith.”
Ingram shrugged. “Bureaucracy. You know what records are like. In this automatic world of ours, computers sometimes spit out idiocies.”
Jenny looked at Simon. “Give me another drink, please.”
“Yes, darling. But remember you have had your pills.’
“Pills?” said Ingram. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know you were ill, Mrs. Pargetter.”
“Sedatives,” said Simon quickly. “My wife has been rather tense recently. And this business doesn’t help. You understand?”
“I do indeed. I’m very sorry that I have to bother her at such a time… Mrs. Pargetter, do you know where Vanessa is?”
“She’s nowhere,” answered Jenny, thickly. “Black Joe says so, and he always tells the truth… Do you know what I did this afternoon, Mr. Ingram? No, of course you don’t. I went to Somerset House to check on her birth entry. It wasn’t there.”
“The system isn’t perfect,” said Ingram. “No doubt Sir Joseph’s young men had similar difficulties. Perhaps that accounts for the answer he gave in the House.”
“Please don’t treat me like an idiot,” said Jenny, her face white. “You know that Vanessa exists. You traced me. Why didn’t you tell Joe Humboldt she exists?”
“Parliamentary matters are not my concern, Mrs. Pargetter. It is only my duty to find Vanessa if possible, and see that no harm comes to her. Can you help me?”
Jenny downed the second gin and tonic. “Help you! You are one of Black Joe’s men. I wouldn’t help you to find a taxi.”
“Please excuse her, Mr. Ingram,” said Simon anxiously. “This is a trying time. My wife, as you can see, is under some stress. Perhaps you could come back tomorrow morning? I’m sure Jenny will feel better then.”
“I’m sorry, sir. Time is important to us, as you will appreciate.”
Jenny gave a brittle laugh. “I have just thought of something. We still live in a democracy. Humboldt can’t have it all his own way yet. I’ll call a press conference and tell everybody that I’m Vanessa’s mother. I’ll tell them all I know, and—“
“Just what do you know, Mrs. Pargetter?” Ingram struck like a snake.
Simon, alert to all the implications, cast a despairing look at his wife. Jenny was in no mood for caution.
“Attend the press conference, and find out.”
Ingram sighed. “There will be no press conference, Mrs. Pargetter. If there were, you would simply be discredited as a neurotic woman. Officially, your daughter does not exist. But there will be no press conference.”
Simon put a hand on Jenny’s shoulder, trying to reassure her, trying to calm her, trying to restrain her. But she was in no mood for restraint.
Again she laughed. “I am a free citizen. I have committed no crime. Try and stop me. Let us see who will be discredited.”
Even before she had finished speaking, Denzil Ingram pressed a button on a small electronic device he had in his pocket. He was not happy. This was going to be one of those jobs where everything had to be done the hard way.
Simon Pargetter, not knowing that it was already too late, did his best to avert the collision. “My wife is overwrought, Mr. Ingram. Perhaps if I were to talk to her alone for a few minutes, it would—” He never completed his sentence.
There was a noise at the door, a dull plop. Then the door opened and four men burst into the flat. When they saw Denzil Ingram sitting calmly in his chair, they stood still, as if awaiting orders. Jenny gazed at them open-mouthed. Simon seemed numbed.
“Mr. Pargetter,” said Ingram, “I really am sorry about this, but your wife’s attitude leaves me no choice. I cannot afford to take risks.”
“What are these men doing here?” stormed Jenny. “Get them out! Get them out of my home! I’m going to bring a criminal charge against you for this.”
“Jenny, please. You’re making it worse.” Simon Pargetter had enough grip on reality to know what was happening.
Denzil Ingram stood up. “Mrs. Pargetter, I am taking you and your husband into protective custody. You will both be well looked after in comfortable surroundings. Perhaps you would like to pack a few things.”
“Protective custody!” Jenny screamed. “Who are these people—Black Joe’s thugs?” She flung her empty glass at him. Her aim was good, and Ingram was caught by surprise. The glass shattered on his forehead, leaving a small cut.
Jeez, I’m getting old, he told himself. You can never tell with women. One of the snatch team had drawn a gun. Ingram motioned to him to put it away. Then he took out a handkerchief and dabbed at the blood he felt trickling down towards his left eye.
“Mrs. Pargetter, I am convinced you know something about Vanessa. It may be important, or it may not. You will have to be probed.”
“You can’t do that,” said Simon angrily. “You don’t have the power.”
Ingram gave a faint smile. “You would be amazed to know what powers I have, Mr. Pargetter. You really would. Now, let’s not waste any more time.”
Dr. Lindemann broke the ampoule and quickly filled his hypodermic syringe. Dugal sat passively on the chair, staring out through the window. There were dark circles round his eyes. A growing child needs quite a lot of sleep. Dugal had had very little during the past three days.
Lindemann was not naturally callous. He knew that the boy was near to exhaustion; and he had tried to use some of his other star paranormals to ease the burden. But Dugal, he knew, was the only one who could effectively reach Vanessa. Dugal, at his best, and with the will, could pass all her blocks and go in deep.
The scientist knew now that his professional future depended on producing results. He, certainly, was not unaware of the extraordinary powers of Denzil Ingram. He was sorry for Dugal. But, in a matter of survival, the ancient law obtained: sauve qui peut.
Dugal knew what Dr. Lindemann was doing. But he did not want to see the needle. It was natural. The effect of the injection had been explained to him—as well as it is possible to explain a complicated biochemical process to a small child.
He knew that he was going to get a shot of a wonder drug called Amplia Nine. Dr. Lindemann had told him that it would make him feel full of energy, full of life, that it would destroy tiredness and make him feel that he could do anything he wanted to do.
What Dr. Lindemann had not told him was that Amplia Nine—a spin-off from hallucinogenic research—would temporarily amplify his mental talents. Also Dr. Lindemann neglected to inform him that this short-term magnification of his natural abilities would eventually be paid for by the destruction of several million of his brain cells.
Research has shown that one shot of Amplia Nine would reduce the Intelligence Quotient of an average person by five to seven points. A second shot would reduce it by eight to fifteen points. A third shot would produce, in the end, a moron.
“Well, Dugal?”
“I’m ready, Dr. Lindemann.” Dugal held out his arm, but still looked out through the window. “You promise it will help Vanessa?”
“Yes, I promise.” Lindemann pressed the needle into the boy’s arm.
Dugal flinched, but he did not complain.
“For the next hour,” said Dr. Lindemann, “you will feel a little drowsy. But after that you will be wide awake and stronger than you have ever been before. When that happens, I want you to concentrate on reaching Vanessa. She may have blocks, but I don’t think they will bother you. I want you to go in deep and find out everything you can. Remember, we need to know where she is, we need to know if she is safe, we want to help her.”
Dugal yawned. His arm was itching somewhat, but it did not seem to matter.
“I’ll probe her,” he said. “But can I talk to her?”
“Talk to her?”
“Explain that we all want to help her.”
Dr. Lindemann smiled. “Talk to her, by all means, Dugal. But rem
ember that she may not believe what you say. Personally, I think that she has been very ill. The important thing is for you to remember everything. Do you understand?”
Dugal yawned once more. “I understand, Dr. Lindemann. But will Vanessa understand?”
Professor Raeder was in a didactic mood. He confronted his small group of paranormals as if they were students in tutorial—which, perhaps, they were.
But, such students! Quasimodo, childish, yet telepathically lethal; Janine, twenty years old and the oldest in the group, a voyeur nymphomaniac and a probe of quite exceptional powers; Alfred, seventeen, a raw-boned youth and an extrovert who could break almost any block or throw up a wall that would stop anyone, including Janine; Robert, eleven, whose powers of telepathic suggestion were, as far as Professor Raeder knew, unique; Sandra, nine, a telehypnotist of erratic brilliance.
“As I see it,” said Professor Raeder, “the situation is of classic simplicity. It is a case of Mahomet and the mountain. We, collectively, are Mahomet, Vanessa Smith is the mountain. We must call her to come to us. We must use every means—persuasion, hypnotic suggestion, terror. We must build in her a compulsion to come to the Scottish Highlands. But, if that fails, we must be prepared to go to her. She is the burning glass we need. She is the one who can accept your transmissions and focus them into a tight beam. She is the one who will enable your combined talents to destroy this creature Humboldt. From now on, you will conduct an assault on Vanessa around the clock. It will be done in relays. Janine will weaken her—soften her up, I believe, is the phrase. Then Alfred will block undesirable contacts while Sandra and Robert combine to make her come to us. That there are flaws in this programme, I am aware. We do not know precisely where Vanessa is.
“We do not know this because she herself does not know it. But we do know that she has comfortable surroundings, that she is physically fit and that she feels secure. We know that she is in a country cottage and that she is being protected—if that is the right word—by an artist who calls himself Oliver Anderson. We have found all these things in Vanessa’s mind.”
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