I've pared my list down to one, said Ramsay. I don't envision it as a factor on the foreign policy side. And you can put it down to my media bias, but the thing I see fast approaching is a Congressional vote on that damned Federal Media Council.
Cusick had a good poker face, and he was using it. What if it passes?
Ramsay shrugged. Maybe nothing much. Might depend on who chairs it, and how they interpret their clout. Eventually it could be a Supreme Court issue, but the court moves slowly. A hell of a lot of censorship could come down the pike before that.
Cusick nodded. I don't suppose you have any ideas about exactly how Donnersprache works, or what it is, he said, stirring the air with one daintily gloved hand.
Yeah, I do. Pretty obvious, once you research Walter Kalvin's background-and Rand's, Ramsay said. You've researched Kalvin. His degrees; the way Rand's career went into high gear after he and Kalvin got together; all that stuff?
Another nod. An interesting view, said Cusick, noncommittal; maybe too much so.
I don't know how many people are in on the Donnersprache idea, but I think it could be Kalvin's alone. I'm sure Rand knows, of course.
You are? I for one am amazed at the things our President doesn't know, said Tom Cusick. And at the things Kalvin does know.
Like how to build that goddamned Donnersprache gizmo into a hand-held mike, Ramsay said. I'd love to get my hands on one. I'm sure he has a fucking drawer full of 'em.
For the record, Alan, I think you're fantasizing.
Ramsay grinned. But off the record?
Cusick's button-dark eyes were hard as he shook his head. Under enough duress, everything goes on record. I can't give you anything that isn't for the record.
Ramsay's hand slapped the table with blinding speed, but without great impact. What the hell can you give me, then?
Tom Cusick's reaction was quick; a defensive motion with both arms, just as quickly relaxed. Easy, friend. Pretty quick hands, by the way; I like it. Let's talk about something else, he said abruptly. We aren't as well-heeled as we'd like, but foresight and the right handshake can sometimes beat money. What if worst came to worst, and you needed to-what we used to call exfiltrate?
Ramsay frowned, then made a connection. Disappear, you mean? False ID, that sort of thing?
A nod. Don't think it can't happen. I've needed it to keep my head screwed on more than once, Cusick reminded him. Or maybe just a safe house for a few days. Most of that, we can do. What we won't do, his smile was wry and lopsided as he waggled a hand like a listing boat, others can, and we can point you in the right direction.
Ramsay needed a moment before making a troubled headshake. I'll keep it in mind, but that's not my style. And it presupposes that something has happened to Laurie.
Not at all. It just supposes someone decides to take you out. You're the one who's dangerous, not your little girl. And if you decide you need to run for it, call me. If you get the answering machine, whistle the highest, steadiest pitch you can for as long as you can; it's an alert signal. You can whistle?
Yeah. Look, why the hell don't you just contact some other media people? A dozen of 'em; somebody not connected to me. Then Laurie would no longer be-oh, my God, he said, seeing Cusick's lowered head, and its slow negative shake. When she's no longer important, you're saying I won't get her back.
I'm wishing I could tell you otherwise, Cusick said. I realize now that we should've broken this to a dozen people simultaneously. But we didn't, we chose you.
Some favor, said Ramsay, his jaw twitching.
Some favor, Cusick echoed.
THIRTEEN
TRANSCRIPT OF CONVERSATION FROM
PERSONAL FILES OF TERENCE L. UNRUH
(BY SUBPOENA; UNDATED):
U: Go to Beta scrambler, please.
K: Wait a minute. Okay, on my mark: mark. (BRIEF LINE INTERFERENCE)
U: Kalvin, something's wrong with Ramsay.
K: (LAUGHS) There's supposed to be.
U: No, I mean he's not behaving right. He's been trying to talk back to those messages from his daughter, and I've recorded it for analysis. The stress analyzer showed he was climbing the walls. Now he's not.
K: Don't expect him to stay at panic stress levels forever, Unruh. Take my word for it, he should level off at medium to high arousal.
U: Well, he did. But he dropped off that plateau a couple of days ago.
K: Not too surprising if, uh, he's probably taking downers. That would figure, and you could verify it with Garza, I imagine.
U: I had Bobby Lathrop ask her about that. She says not, but Bobby is worried about her dependability. I'm not new on a stress analyzer, Kalvin, and I tell you the man is psyched up, wired. I don't know-
K: If that's all that's bothering you, see to it that his kid is crying in tonight's call. Must I think of everything?
U: You'd better, and one thing you'd best think about is just how long you can keep a man like Ramsay on the edge of a nervous breakdown. If he blows his top, Christ knows what he might say, and I don't have enough men to assault a mental ward.
K: Two weeks, Unruh, two lousy frigging weeks. I trusted you to recruit all the assets you needed.
U: Look, I'm, uh, just sending you a flare. There's something going on in Ramsay's head and if it's a short fuse to a blowup, you could be lookin' at that fast flight to Quebec.
K: We covered that a long time ago, Terry. You said my exfiltration was all in place.
U: It is. But it's not exactly your favorite scenario, is it?
K: I was just asking; it won't be needed. Not ever, if everything goes as it's tracking now. You just take care of your assets and I'll take care of mine. Uh, how are you doing? Personally, I mean.
U: Am I still dying, you mean. (LAUGHS) I'll last more than two weeks, asshole. I intend to stick around long enough to see what comes from all this.
K: In the meantime, if you're right, you'll need to run tighter surveillance on Ramsay.
U: I'm spending several hours a day getting treatments, Kalvin. I can't be expected-
K: Just handle it.
U: You're all heart. (LINE INTERFERENCE. MESSAGE ENDS.)
FOURTEEN
Laurie knew the agenda all too well. Johnnie never skipped more than one night in making Laurie describe the news, and she had skipped the previous night. So, later tonight, Laurie would be tightly bound again for Johnnie's foray outside and when she returned the hated demonvoice would form obscenities while the hands and mouth performed worse obscenities and at last Johnnie would drink her tequila. Laurie felt her lip curl. She knew her teeth were showing; she did not recognize it as a smile. Johnnie switched TV programs on a precise time schedule according to the small comm set by the TV, its digital readout relentlessly counting off the last hours of life. The compact Sony unit was clearly more than a recorder with earphones and clock because once or twice a day, at no predictable intervals, it would emit a series of thin chirps. Immediately, Johnnie would punch a code into the calculator. Laurie had earned a slap for watching the woman operate that pocket comm set. Laurie had realized that the chirps were incoming queries. Johnnie's coded response told someone, somewhere, that all was well.
Johnnie would not ignore that signal merely because it woke her in the night, as sometimes happened. The outstanding virtue of Reba Jondahl was her passion for obedience-whether she was master or servitor. Laurie Ramsay had come to understand this central pillar of Johnnie's existence. Because they were short-handed, Bobby Lathrop could not afford sloppy work and rejoiced to have someone like the Jondahl woman who, ex-con or not, kept highly dependable routines.
Now Laurie, too, joined in that rejoicing. Exactly on time as always, Johnnie went to the bathroom carrying her heavy purse and the comm set. Laurie sat against a bare wall where she could watch the TV. And as usual for the past few days, the girl seemed to be dozing, her blonde head on her knees. Laurie knew how to create a routine, too.
Laurie kept her breathing steady until the ba
throom door closed, knowing that she must complete her stealthy work within two minutes or so. She moved quickly, terrified at small sounds; the pop of her joints, the clink of utensils. She had replaced everything and was near Johnnie's cot, with its supply of magazines and bottles beneath, when Johnnie emerged too soon from the bathroom.
Neither of them moved for a moment. Then, Going somewhere? from Johnnie in a snarled parody of sweetness.
Laurie, trembling too hard to speak, could only shake her head.
Johnnie deposited her purse and comm set on the card table, then reached toward the cowering girl. Thought I wasn't watching, she rasped, prying at Laurie's balled fists and finding them empty of contraband. Thought you could play fuck-around with Johnnie, she went on, ripping at the pockets of Laurie's filthy jumper.
Laurie's denials made no difference. She took two heavy slaps across her face, tried to protect her head with her hands, then fell to the floor and submitted, sobbing, to Johnnie's body search. That was what made the difference, for the woman found a child's handful of corn chip fragments and a small ball of used adhesive tape in Laurie's pockets.
Johnnie, breathing hard, tossed the ball of tape into the fireplace and surveyed the sad little hoard of food fragments she had scattered to the floor. Clean up that shit, she commanded, assuring that Laurie saw the mess by grasping the girl's hair and shaking her head above it. Then Johnnie seated herself at the table and found a TV sitcom, watching occasionally as Laurie, on hands and knees, carefully removed specks of food and cast them into the fireplace.
At last the job was complete. Don't do that again, Johnnie warned. Laurie sensed that the woman did not know what 'that' had been. And through her sniffles, behind her cowering as she slumped down against the baseboard, Laurie knew it would not be necessary to do it again.
Laurie saw her dad on the nightly news, and thought that he looked older. At Johnnie's command, she duly recited to the comm set about the pileup on the Anacostia Bridge. When she added, And Johnnie beat me up for nothing, she collected another slap. She did not know whether that accusation would reach her father. She did know it would make Johnnie mad as hell.
To make matters worse, when Johnnie brought the adhesive tape from her purse the procedure became a struggle. Johnnie always hurried to lock up for her brief absences. The woman was brutally efficient, dragging Laurie to her pallet and locking her in. Presently, Laurie heard the outside door lock and, weeping from fresh bruises, she fell asleep. She knew that she would soon be awakened.
Johnnie's return, and her sick attentions to Laurie, were routines the girl suffered with a sort of ghastly anticipation. This time Johnnie carried her to the cot, removing the tape from her ankles but leaving her wrists and mouth taped.
After ten minutes Johnnie sat on the edge of the cot, her drives assuaged. Starting to like it, she accused, in that notwoman voice Laurie had come to equate with Satan's. In prison, you develop a taste for a lot of things. But not the stinkin' chock, she said with her coarse-grind laugh, bringing the tequila bottle from under the cot. You make chock from cornmeal, sugar, raisins, yeast, anything you can get on the inside. Always tasted like shit to me. Not like this, she added, unstoppering the bottle.
She turned and smiled down, staring into the girl's eyes that, despite the tears, stared back. This Sauza is good stuff, she confided, swirling the remaining few ounces of nearly clear liquid, and then took a triumphant swig.
Johnnie swallowed over an ounce before the gag reflex closed her windpipe. It had taken Laurie Ramsay over two weeks to collect and evaporate the stuff, percolated through wood ash, that became four ounces of a primary ingredient of old-time soap: concentrated caustic lye. It had taken her less than two minutes to substitute it for tequila. It took Johnnie only seconds to realize that the lining of her throat was gone.
Johnnie blinked as she flung the bottle aside, but not fast enough to prevent a splash of lye into her eyes. She leaped to her feet, convulsed with an agony that spread from her throat and face into her belly, then wheeled back to the cot. Reba Jondahl had known from the first that she would have her choice of ways to kill the girl, and had already decided on slow strangulation. Now, even deeper than the fiery pulse in her guts, one intent burned in her brain: to reach the girl's throat. Johnnie, half-blinded and unable to breathe, reached down with both hands.
Wrists still bound behind her, Laurie saw it all, just as she had hoped, and knew what those callused claws were seeking. Lying on her back with knees flexed, Laurie used her left leg to push off and swept her right leg up with every ounce of fury an eleven-year-old soccer jock could muster. Laurie's kick was awkward but her sturdy legs were driven by desperation. Her right heel caught Johnnie precisely on the jawline, full force.
The woman spun on her left foot; crashed against the card table; fell face-down as the table knelt, spilling the lamp and TV set onto her body. Reba Jondahl was aflame from inside and her ruined throat would not permit the passage of enough air. Rolling onto her back, mouth wide, she began to claw at her own face.
Laurie rolled from the cot in mortal terror and leaped to her feet. She had not expected Johnnie to recover and she knew that, if her hands were not free soon, the woman would certainly kill her.
The tape on her wrists would not yield. She knelt at the raised hearth, her back toward it, and began to worry the tape against the abrasive edges of bricks.
Even though her mucous membranes were slowly being flayed alive, Johnnie somehow began to manage a hoarse whistle of breath. Semiconscious, she rolled over, staring through her agony. She was clinically blind by this time but she could see the girl's vague shape facing her. And her lungs seemed on the verge of getting enough air. On hands and knees, carrying an inferno in her body, Johnnie lurched in Laurie's direction, paced by the whistling rasp of her breath.
Laurie kept sawing at the bricks until the last possible instant, then scrambled up, and her sidewinder kick took Johnnie across the bridge of the nose, snapping her head hard enough to make her hair fly outward. Johnnie fell on her side but, instead of continuing to kick, Laurie ran to the bathroom. Perhaps, she thought wildly, she could slam the door for more precious seconds of life. But her clothing caught on the latch striker plate protruding from the door facing, and the rip gave Laurie new hope. She worked to catch the frayed tape against the little tongue of brass, moaning with terror because she could see Johnnie come up on hands and knees again, blood runneling from her nose.
Then Laurie felt the tape begin to yield, caught at it with desperate fingers, tore harder against the brass plate heedless of the pain at her wrists. When two layers of tape wore through, perspiration helped her slide from the rest. Laurie, tearing away the strips at her mouth, slammed herself into the bathroom.
Which had no exit.
The only light was from the crack under the door, and Laurie knew that the devil herself would soon be at that door, obscuring all of her light forever, and when Laurie wrenched the door open again Johnnie stood almost erect, leaning in the hallway, wiping at her eyes and making that dreadful hoarse gasping noise. It was not so much courage as horrified panic that sent Laurie bolting past, her arms windmilling furiously, her small body slamming past Johnnie to sprawl into the big room in the half-light of the lamp on the floor.
There in full view lay Johnnie's big purse, open, with a small holster clipped inside it. Laurie fumbled the dead-black thing with the thick handle out of the purse and turned to face her pursuer. She had never heard of a Heckler Koch P7, but she knew it was an automatic pistol. And even a child could see that sighting was no more complicated than alignment of two white dots in the rear with one white dot in front.
Johnnie may have thought that Laurie was only threatening, holding the H K at a range of two paces. That was because Laurie's hands were small and initially, even with a two-handed grip, she was not fully depressing the. squeeze-cocker safety. When Laurie finally succeeded, Johnnie's opinion was revised by a thunderous noise and a single nine-millime
ter round just above Johnnie's navel. The woman doubled over as though lashed by an invisible foot, then sat down hard in a way that would have been comical in other circumstances and slowly fell on her side.
Laurie had never fired a weapon and, unprepared for the sound and recoil, dropped the pistol. By the time she recovered it, Johnnie half-lay on the floor, face contorted, fumbling with the little comm set as she tried to operate it blindly.
Laurie knew that the woman was in hideous agony, and that Johnnie was in some ways not quite human. And she also knew what you were supposed to do with animals in hopeless pain. Buoyed by this rationale she found it easy, with the muzzle an inch behind Johnnie's skull, to squeeze the trigger once more.
Dean Ing - Silent Thunder Page 11