Aaron Elkins - Fellowship Of Fear

Gideon hiked himself into a sitting position so that his eyes were level with John’s. It took more effort than he expected. "Look, let me level with you, and maybe you’ll do the same with me. I’m in way over my head with this spy business I’ve gotten myself into. What I’m wondering is, are you really a cop, or are you a spy or an agent or whatever they call it?" John began to answer, but Gideon cut him off. "And am I some kind of a pawn? I don’t like being used, especially when it nearly gets me killed."

John frowned, arranging his words. He tipped his chair forward onto all four legs again. "My branch is Safety," he said slowly, with careful emphasis on each word. "Protection of life and property. We’re just like the MPs, only we get assignments that cut across their lines. As of this year, I’m assigned to USOC. Before that I was doing the same thing for USAREUR, before that at AFCENT in Holland. And before that I was an ordinary, run-of-the-mill cop in San Diego and Honolulu. I couldn’t be more ordinary and run-of-the-mill if I tried. Until you started making my life complicated, that is." It was a long speech for John. He blew out his breath as if he’d been chopping down trees.

Gideon nodded slowly. "I believe you," he said. "Tell me this, John. Do you think there’s any connection between what Marks and Delvaux asked me to do and these things that have been happening to me?"

"I don’t know what they asked you to do, but I’ve been wondering the same thing." He gestured at the pudding. "Hey, go ahead and eat your whatever-it-is."

Gideon made a small gesture of impatience. "Is that really true? That you don’t know? It’s hard to believe an organization could function that way, the right hand not knowing what the left is doing."

"Doc, we have to operate that way. We work on a need-toknow basis. The fewer people who know the dirty stuff, the better. Intelligence doesn’t have any trouble finding out what we’re doing, because we’re not into nasty tricks and sensitive information. But they don’t tell us what they’re doing, and we don’t ask." He paused. "We’re not supposed to, anyway."

It was the hint Gideon had been waiting for. "Well, I’d like to tell you anyway. All this craziness has to be connected. It’s stupid to treat it as a bunch of unrelated incidents." He waited for an invitation to go on, but John just looked at him with a faint smile. "Besides," Gideon continued, "I don’t trust Marks. I do trust you."

"Oh, you can trust him," said John, "he’s just, well…"

"A nerd. John, would I be compromising you by telling you about it?"

"Yes," said John in a small, stern voice. Then he smiled, and then the smile became the laughter of schoolboys sharing secrets.

Gideon told him about the interview in Heidelberg, the theft of the socks, and the subsequent interview in the base laundry. John listened, walking about the room, neither taking notes nor asking questions. "Huh," he said finally. "How about that?"

"Come on, John, don’t be inscrutable with me. It all has to be related, doesn’t it?"

The policeman came back to the chair and sat down. "Here’s what I would like: I would like it if you would eat your dessert, and if I could please be the cop, and I ask questions, and you answer them. Okay?"

Gideon laughed and winced once more. "Okay."

He spooned up a lump of the gray pudding and pushed it around his mouth with his tongue. "My God, what is this stuff? It’s insoluble."

"What, the pudding or the case?"

Gideon remembered to catch himself before laughing. "Why, John, that’s funny."

Lau accepted the compliment with a slight nod. "Let’s go over a few things. I’m assuming that none of these guys were the same as the ones that jumped you in Heidelberg."

"Right. These were Italians."

"You mean they spoke Italian."

"No, they were Italian. I don’t understand the language, but a native speaker-"

Lau held up his hand. "Okay, I forgot. We’ve been through this before. Speech rhythms and so forth."

"Right."

Lau bowed his head in mock defeat. "All right. What about the one that showed up at the end, the one who apparently saved you? You told the shore patrol he looked familiar. Was he one of them?"

"One of the ones from Heidelberg?" For a moment Gideon wasn’t sure. Could he have been the ferret-faced man? The man on the bridge had seemed to move in the same spare, powerful, dangerous way. No, Ferret-face had been more compact, more coiled.

"I don’t think so," he said. "No, definitely not. In fact, I assumed he was with the shore patrol, but they told me no."

"But he spoke like an American?"

"Yes, he did-I think. This time I’m not completely sure. I wasn’t concentrating too well at the time."

"Doc, if you could try to remember where you’d seen him, it could make a big difference."

"You’re telling me. I’ve thought about it so much, I’m not sure anymore that he was familiar. John, go back a minute; why would you think that one of those bastards from Heidelberg would be saving my life now?"

"Well, are we really sure he was trying to help you? You were pretty groggy at the time, and you didn’t see how it ended."

Gideon absent-mindedly tongued another nodule of pudding. "Still, it wouldn’t make sense…"

"No, I don’t think so either. I’m just trying to find the connection between the two incidents."

"Then you think there is one?"

"Sure, no doubt in my mind. These kinds of things don’t happen to people in real life. Once is strange enough, but twice-uh-uh, something’s going on."

"God, I’m glad to hear you say that. I was starting to think I was getting paranoid."

The nurse came in to take Gideon’s tray. "Mes compliments au chef," he said. "Formidable.

"Don’t be smart. Doctor’s going to be very disappointed when I tell him you didn’t eat up all your gunk."

"Do you suppose I could get some hot tea, Sue? I need something to dissolve that stuff."

"Sure." She turned to John. "Coffee?"

"That’d be great. Thanks."

"John," Gideon said, as the door swung closed, "am I suspected of anything? Some kind of involvement in… all this? Dope or something?"

"Look, Doc, I don’t know what’s going on myself, so I’m not ruling anything out. But I don’t think anyone seriously suspects you of anything. Least of all me."

"Thank you. I appreciate your saying that."

The tea and coffee were wordlessly brought by a shy, pretty candy-striper who left quickly, and the two men sipped in silence for a few minutes. Gideon was feeling very relaxed, and the tea was soothing. He drank and watched the dust motes floating in the shafts of strong Sicilian sunshine that filled the hospital room.

With a start, he realized he was dozing and looked up to see the policeman smiling at him, his coffee finished.

"I know I’m not the world’s greatest interrogator," John said, "but I don’t usually put ‘em to sleep."

"I’m sorry-"

"No, you look like you can use it. If you’re up to it tomorrow, there are some pictures I’d like you to look at in the Security Office. I’ll come by about eleven."

"Pictures…?" Before he could complete the thought, Gideon was asleep again. He was awakened for a dinner of stewed chicken and vegetables, ate hungrily, and slept soundly until morning.

"NOTHING, huh?"

"Not a thing." Gideon pushed himself away from the table, rubbed the nape of his neck, and leaned back in his chair. He had been leafing through photographs for an hour. "Where did you get all these characters?"

"Local bad guys," John said. "Mafia, gangsters, a few others. Anybody I thought might be a good bet."

"But you didn’t really think they’d turn up."

"No."

They sat, quiet and a little depressed, John’s fingers gently tapping the table. A clerk came to the doorway and motioned at him. "Telephone."