Arthur Hailey - Evening News

Insen's office had a large glass window overlooking the Horseshoe, with a venetian blind for privacy when needed. After helping Sloane into a chair, Insen lowered the blind.

Control was coming back to Sloane, though he was leaning forward, his head in his hands. Speaking half to himself, half to Insen, he agonized, "Those people knew about Nicky and the piano. And how did they know? I let it out! It was me! At that press session after the kidnap.”

Insen said gently, "I remember that, Crawf. But you were answering a question; you didn't bring it up. In any case, who could have foreseen . . .” He stopped, knowing that reasoning at this moment would do no good.

Afterward Insen would say to others, "I have to hand it to Crawf, He has guts. After that experience most people would have been pleading to do exactly what the kidnappers wanted. But right from the beginning Crawf's known we shouldn't, and couldn't, and has never wavered.”

There was a soft knock and the secretary came in.”A doctor's on the way,” she said.

* * *

The temporary ban on people leaving the building was lifted when everyone inside or about to leave was identified and their presence accounted for. It seemed likely that the package with the fingers had been left much earlier, and since restaurant service people came and left frequently, no one had seen anything unusual.

The FBI began an investigation at nearby takeout restaurants in an effort to determine who might have brought the package in, but nothing resulted. And while CBA Security was supposed to check all delivery people's identity, it was established that they did so irregularly and even then in a perfunctory way. Any doubt about the fingers being Nicky's was quickly dispelled by an FBI check of Nicky's bedroom in the Sloanes' Larchmont house. Plenty of fingerprints remained there and matched those of the two severed fingers in the package on Crawford Sloane's desk.

* * *

In the midst of the general gloom at CBA News, another significant delivery occurred, this one to Stonehenge. Early Thursday afternoon a small package found its way to Margot Lloyd-Mason's office suite. Inside was a videotape cassette sent by Sendero Luininoso.

Because the tape was expected—Thursday delivery had been stated in Sendero's "The Shining Time Has Come” demand received six days earlier—arrangements had been made by Margot and Les Chippingham for the tape to be sent immediately by messenger to the CBA news president. As soon as Chippingham teamed of its arrival, he called in Don Kettering and Norman Jaeger and the trio viewed the tape privately in Chippingham's office.

All three noted at once the recording's high quality, both technically and in presentation. The opening titles, beginning with "World Revolution: Sendero Luminoso Shows the Way,” were superimposed over the visual background of some of Peru's most breathtaking scenery—the brooding majesty of high Andes mountains and glaciers, Machu Picchu in awesome splendor, the endless miles of green jungle, the and coastal desert and surging Pacific ocean. It was Jaeger who recognized the majestic music accompanying the opening: Beethoven's Third Symphony, Eroica .

”They had production people who know their business,” Kettering murmured.”I'd expected something cruder.”

"Not surprising, really,” Chippingham said.”Peru's no backwater and they have talent there, the best equipment.”

"Which Sendero has big bucks to buy,” Jaeger added.”Plus their foxy infiltration everywhere.”

Even the extremist spiel that followed was largely over kinetic scenes—of rioting in Lima, industrial strikes, clashes between police and protest marchers, the grisly aftermath of attacks on Andes villages by government forces.”We are the world,” an unseen commentator expounded, "and the world is ready for a revolutionary explosion.”

Featured at length was an interview, stated to be with Abimael Guzman, Sendero Luminoso's founder and leader. Some uncertainty existed because the camera focused on the back of a seated person. The commentator explained, "Our leader has many enemies who would like to kill him. To show his face would help their vicious aims.”

Guzman's supposed voice began in Spanish, " Companeros revolucionarios, nuestro trabajo y objetivo es unir los creyentes en la filosofia de Marx, Lenin, y Mao . . .”Then the words faded and a new voice continued, "Comrades, we must destroy worldwide a social order that is not fit to be preserved . . .”

"Doesn't Guzman speak English?” Kettering queried.

Jaeger answered, "Strangely, he's one of the few educated Peruvians who don't.”

What followed was predictable and had been spoken by Guzman many times before.”Revolution is justified because of imperialist exploitation of all poor people in the world.”. . .”False reports blame Sendero Luminoso for inhumanity. Sendero is more humane than the superpowers who are willing to destroy mankind with nuclear arsenals, which our proletariat revolution will ban forever.”. . .”The United States labor movement, an elite bourgeois class, has cheated and sold out American workers.”...”Communists in the Soviet Union are no better than imperialists. The Soviets have betrayed the Lenin revolution.”..."Cuba's Castro is a clown, an imperialist lackey.”

Guzman's statements were invariably, general. Those seeking specifics searched his speeches and writings in vain.

”If we were running this instead of the evening news,” Chippingham commented, "we'd have lost our audience by now and ratings would be in the cellar.”

The recorded half hour ended with additional Beethoven, some more scenic beauty and a rallying cry from the commentator, "Long life to Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, our guiding doctrine!”

"All right,” Chippingham said at the end, "as we agreed, I'm putting this tape away in my safe. Only the three of us have viewed it. I suggest we don't discuss with anyone what we've seen.”

Jaeger asked, "You're still going with Karl Owens's idea the story that the cassette was damaged when we received it?”

"For chrissakes! Do we have anything else? We're certainly not going to use that tape in place of Monday's news.”

"I guess we don't have anything else,” Jaeger acknowledged.

”As long as we understand,” Kettering said, "that our chances of being believed aren't as good now—not after Theo Elliott's screw up with the Baltimore Star.”

“Goddamn, I know that!” The news president's voice reflected the strain of the past few days. He glanced at a clock: 3:53.”At four o'clock, Don, break into the network with a bulletin. Say that we've received a tape from the kidnappers, but it's defective and we haven't been able to fix it. Getting a replacement tape to us is now up to Sendero Luminoso.”

"Right!”

"Meanwhile,” Chippingham, continued, "I'll call in press relations and issue a statement for the wire services, urging them to repeat it to Peru. Now let's move it!”

* * *

The misinformation issued by CBA News was circulated promptly and widely. Because Peru was one hour behind New York—the U.S. was still on daylight saving time, Peru wasn't the CBA statement was available in Lima for evening radio and TV news as well as the following day's newspapers.

Also in the day's news, though circulated earlier, was a report about the discovery of Nicholas Sloane's severed fingers by his distraught father.

In Ayacucho, Sendero Luminoso leaders noted both reports. As to the second, about a damaged tape, they did not believe it. What was needed immediately, they reasoned, was some action more compelling than a small boy's fingers.

Afterward, Jessica remembered, she had a sense of foreboding as soon as she awoke that morning in the half-light of dawn. She had been sleepless through much of the night, mentally tormented, doubting that rescue would ever come. Over the past three days her earlier confidence in eventual freedom had ebbed away, though she tried to conceal from Angus and Nicky her diminishing hope. But was it likely, she wondered, that in this obscure portion of an alien, faraway land, some friendly force could find and somehow spirit them home? As more days went by, it seemed increasingly doubtful.