David Baldacci - Simple Genius

“Well, my husband actually runs the place. Again, it’s not exactly a state secret.”

Sean appeared stunned. “Valerie, let me ask you one simple question.”

“Why would a man like that let his wife go to bars by herself and have dinner with strange men?” Sean nodded. “Well, let me give you a simple answer. He doesn’t care what I do. Some days I don’t know why he married me. Well, I do. I make a terrific first impression. But with Ian, the effect wore off.”

“So if Ian goes his way and you go yours, why not just divorce?”

She shrugged. “Divorces tend to get nasty and take too much energy. You said you’d been divorced. Isn’t that true?”

“Very true,” he admitted. “I guess he keeps pretty busy. I mean with the war on terror and everything.”

“Or it just could be that I’m not interesting enough,” she said.

Sean sat back and looked pensive. “It was love at first sight for my wife and me. But then she changed, or I changed, who the hell knows. She didn’t like lawyers very much. I guess it was doomed from the start.”

“Maybe that’s what happened to me too.”

“Why, how did you and Ian meet?”

“I was with a private contractor that worked with CIA. My field is or was bioterrorism long before it became so popular. Ian and I met at a conference in Australia. That was before he’d been promoted to run Camp Peary of course. I’d actually visited the place before I even knew Ian. But I got burned out and left. He still revels in that world. That’s the difference between him and me. And it’s become a big difference.”

“Wait a minute. That’s why it sounded familiar. Didn’t they find a body at Camp Peary?”

Valerie nodded slowly. “The guy apparently climbed over the fence and shot himself.”

“Damn, why would anyone do that?”

“Everybody has issues, problems.”

“You sound like you speak from experience.”

“We all speak from experience, Sean.”

After dinner was over they walked down the street together.

“This was a great evening, Valerie, thank you.”

“It was a depressing evening, due in large part to me.”

Sean remained silent. He simply didn’t have a good answer to this. Finally he said, “I’ll be in town for about a week. Would you like to do this again?”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” she said.

“Could I at least have your phone number?”

“Why?”

“Is there any harm in talking?”

“There’s harm in everything.” Even so, she reached in her purse, pulled out a pen and piece of paper and wrote a number down and handed it to him.

“You can leave a message there; if I don’t call back, well, I’m sorry. Thank you for saving me from another night in that bar. Goodbye.” She touched his arm, then walked off down the street, leaving Sean feeling very troubled. Valerie Messaline was probably what she seemed to be: a lonely woman treading water until something happened. His only viable lead to Camp Peary had just disappeared. Now where should he start looking?

The answer came to him almost as quickly as the question had. The only thing was, would he have the courage, or more accurately, the level of insanity needed to pull it off?

MICHELLE DECIDED TO COMBINE her Viggie duty with a bold tactical move. There was still daylight left so she took the girl down to the boathouse after getting permission from Alicia. There she outfitted Viggie with a proper life jacket after ascertaining that the girl was only a fair swimmer. They pulled a kayak out and were soon on the water with Viggie in front with a paddle and Michelle guiding the craft from the rear while she instructed Viggie on the proper paddling motion.

She quickly mastered the correct motion and soon her cuts were smooth and efficient through the water. Viggie was certainly stronger than she looked, Michelle decided.

“This is fun,” Viggie said as the wind whipped through her hair.

“I love it,” Michelle said. It only took her two cuts in the water with her paddle before she was once more in the groove. When you’ve paddled, collectively, hundreds of thousands of miles in the water, the muscle memory is ingrained.

They quickly came, as Michelle had planned, to the area of the York across from Camp Peary. She stopped paddling and told Viggie to do the same. As they drifted in the current Michelle leaned back, and unobtrusively took in the shrouded-in-secrecy CIA installation. The perimeter fence gleamed back at her. There wasn’t a guard in sight, yet Michelle’s sixth sense told her that eyes were watching.

“That’s Camp Peary,” Viggie said suddenly. “That’s where Monk died.”

“You know about Camp Peary?” Viggie nodded. “Did Monk ever talk to you about it?” Viggie gave another nod. “What’d he say?”

“Stuff.”

“Codes and blood?”

Viggie turned to stare at her. “You’ve been talking to that other man.”

“Horatio Barnes, yes. He’s a friend.” Michelle had to bite her lip on that last comment.

“I don’t like him.”

“Well, he strikes some people the wrong way. So codes and blood? That sounds really interesting.”

One good thing about being on a kayak in the middle of the river, Viggie couldn’t just get up and leave, which was one reason Michelle had brought the girl here.

“Monk liked codes. He taught me about them. He was related to a very famous scientist.”

“And you’re related to him too of course.”

Viggie nodded with a proud look on her face. “Alan Turing was a homosexual. And people back then didn’t like that, so he ate a poisoned apple and died.”

Michelle was at a loss for words with this change in direction of the conversation. Monk really had treated her like an adult. “That is very sad,” she finally said.

“I hope I never have to eat a poisoned apple when people are mad at me.”

“I’m sure you never will, Viggie,” Michelle said firmly. “Taking your own life is never the right answer.” Michelle felt a stab of guilt as she said this.

“It’s like the wicked old queen in Snow White. She turned herself into a hag, got in an old boat and floated down the river to the cottage in the woods. Then she tricked Snow White into eating a poisoned apple. She didn’t die, but she went to sleep. It took a prince kissing her to wake her up. Yuck!”

“Counting on handsome princes to make your life better is not very smart. Right?”

“Right, but it also shows that whoever has the apple is pretty powerful.”

Michelle decided to change the subject. “Viggie, have you ever heard of a secret room at the mansion?”

Viggie turned around. “A secret room?”

“Yes. We were at another old house around here and we found some kids inside a secret room there. One of the kids said lots of the old places down here had secret rooms.”

“I’ve never heard of one at Babbage Town,” Viggie said.

“Okay.” Michelle waited a moment and said, “Speaking of secret stuff could you teach me some codes?”

“There are lots of different kinds. You can make them up too.”

“Did you and Monk make codes up?”

“Oh sure. Lots of times.”

“I guess he wanted to keep things secret from other people. Do you know which people he wanted to keep secrets from?”

“Everybody,” Viggie said. Then she turned and gave Michelle a sly grin. “Including you.”

Michelle suddenly realized that Viggie knew exactly what she was trying to do and was having fun at her expense. Michelle decided to take a more direct tack. It carried risks but they didn’t have many options right now.

“Viggie, we’re trying to find out who took Monk away from you, do you understand that? That’s the only reason we’re here.”