M. Forsythe - While Rome Was Sleeping

He was satisfied with his encounter with Andrew Kincaid—it was evident that everything Charlene knew she had passed on to Kincaid.

His mind went into overdrive; the old excitement of the hunter instinct and blood scent was rising in Brad. “So I don’t intimidate him; we’ll see, Mr. Kincaid. You may be surprised.” Kincaid had thrown down the gauntlet; Brad wasn’t sure of the details, but he was certain of the outcome. It would be almost as satisfactory as the outcome with George Kelshaw.

It had been a long and stimulating day and Brad was very tired; almost immediately upon getting into bed he fell into a deep sleep. He dreamed about Lia—she was standing by his bed laughing, taunting him, beckoning to him to follow her. When she turned to face him he was horrified to see her face covered with red dirt and blood as she had looked when he last laid eyes on her lying dead beside the road on the way to Bien Hoa.

He screamed as he woke up; his heart was pounding and he was in a cold sweat. Turning on the light on the bedside table, he got out of bed to fix himself a drink. His hands were shaking causing the ice to chatter in the glass before he added the liquor.

“My God, what a nightmare…!” He hadn’t thought of Lia for a very long time and this dream frightened him. “It’s all this Kelshaw business,” he muttered trying to reassure himself that was what brought her back to his consciousness. He was having trouble regaining his composure. Still shaken he finished his drink and glanced at his watch, 3:30—“I’ve got to get some sleep,” he said.

The drink was beginning to have its effect. Turning out the light he closed his eyes and again drifted into a troubled sleep.

The voice was clear… he could hear it plainly, as though someone was in the next room calling his name. No, it couldn’t be he couldn’t see anyone; it was as though the room was filled with fog. Then he saw the figure, but it wasn’t Lia. It was George Kelshaw holding something in his hand. Brad tried to speak but he couldn’t; he had no voice. Kelshaw was standing over him nodding his head and saying, “Traitor…” Over and over he repeated “Traitor…”

Once again Brad screamed, “Noooo!” He was sitting bolt upright in bed, heart pounding, sweating and shaking like a leaf. He was gasping for breath; what was going on? He hadn’t had nightmares for years and now, tonight. It was too much. It was 4:30 AM and it was hopeless to try to sleep anymore. He called room service and ordered coffee. “I’ll call Olivia; I need to hear her voice.” He dialed and reality returned as she answered, “Hello.”

“Olivia, I’ll be home on Saturday. I’ll let you know what flight I’ll be on; please meet me.”

“Brad dear, what’s the matter? Of course, I’ll meet you. Just let me know when.”

“I will as soon as I know.”

Now fully awake and once again in command of his reason, Brad felt slightly foolish. “It was only a damned dream,” he told himself. “Olivia, I have a few arrangements to make before leaving Seattle. I should wind it all up today. I will call you again later. Thank you, my dear, for standing by. Oh, by the way, I had dinner with Charlene last evening and things have worked out to both our satisfaction. I thought you’d like to know.”

Olivia Coleman pondered the phone call. Her husband sounded strange at first; then looking at the clock she realized it was only 5:15 in the morning in Seattle. “He was up so early; he must have slept poorly… toward the end of the call he did sound better,” she mused. Still she was troubled.

Friday, September 26, 1980

Andrew was at the Times at 6:30 AM and had placed a call to Neil Klein while the news room was still relatively quiet. “I called to tell you about Coleman’s visit and I wanted to know if you have opened Aunt Martha’s luggage.”

“Yes, Andrew,” Neil replied. “We’ve sent a number of things to the cleaners and are waiting for them to come back. How was the General’s visit?”

“It was very interesting,” Andrew told him. “As was expected, I was not involved in the meetings. Before we get into that though, you told me that Coleman had had a liaison with a Eurasian woman in Saigon. Will you give me her name? I want to do a little digging on my own.”

Neil was silent for a moment and then replied, “Ordinarily I would not be able to tell you her name, but it doesn’t matter now because she’s dead.”

“Really?” Andrew was surprised. “How?”

“It appears she was murdered. Her body was found outside of Saigon; she had been shot several times– her name was Lia Dupre’. You can no doubt get the story through some of your sources. It would have happened early 1970, possibly in March or April or so.” Neil went on. “Her family was well known. Her father was French and the family had Paris connections. In fact, the story might have been carried by Paris newspapers. Now back to Ms. Thayer’s meeting with Coleman.”

“Thanks for the info, Neil, I owe you; okay, the meeting, well, the first one on Wednesday was pretty tense. Coleman told Charlene that the letter was phony. When she didn’t buy it and told him she was going to have the body in Paul’s grave exhumed, Coleman got very nasty and threatened her.”

“Threatened her?” Neil interrupted. “How?”

Andrew quickly said, “The threat was non-specific, but she held her own quite well and told him to leave…”

“She threw him out?” Neil interrupted again.

“Yes,” Andrew affirmed. “He later called and apologized and changed his tune saying that the letter could be genuine. He talked her into meeting with him again last night for dinner at the Olympic.”

“I wish I could have been there. So she met him again; did that go better?”

“I would say it did, at least she was smiling when she left. Oh, I didn’t mention it, but I was in the lobby keeping tabs on things. I decided that the General and I would have a little talk later, which we did.”

Neil smiled a little grimly to himself and thought, typical reporter… “What prompted you to do that, Andrew?”

“My natural curiosity, I wanted to meet him and let him know that there was someone not willing to stand by and let him bully Charlene Thayer.”

Neil remarked, “Sounds as though Ms. Thayer can hold her own pretty well.

“What is your impression of Coleman, Andrew?”

“I don’t like or trust him. He’s tough and powerful, as I would expect him to be, but he’s playing games with Charlene. He told her he now believed the letter to be authentic. Personally, I think the letter is causing him a lot of heartburn; it’s not clear why. And it’s also not clear why he told Charlene that he didn’t know Kelshaw; you and I both know he did. Why lie about it?”

“He knew George Kelshaw very well.” Neil said firmly. “I can only begin to speculate on why he’d lie, and if he’s having discomfort about the letter, there must be a connection.”

“When I confronted him,” Andrew went on, “he warned me to back off; he told me I could be getting in over my head.

“In his words, ‘the power of the press and so on and so on’… blah blah.”

Neil cautioned, “Be careful, Andrew, he could be a formidable enemy. That goes for Mrs. Thayer as well even though she thinks of him as a friend. I believe I should give her a call. Can you arrange to have her at the Seamen’s Center on Sunday afternoon for a call at 2:00 PM your time?”

Andrew was puzzled. “Why the Seamen’s Center?”

“Because yours and her phones may not be secure,” he answered.

“You’re kidding!”

“No, Andrew, I’m sorry. I don’t kid about such things. Not only your phones, but your homes could be bugged also. For the time being, let’s not take any chances. Give your friend Savalza a ‘heads up’ on this. If he checks it out and finds something, tell him to leave everything as is. We don’t want it known we are onto them yet.”