Pretty sharp of Showers, he said.

Walter Kalvin, you mean, she replied, opening the oven door. I gather from little things Tate says and does that Kalvin's the brains behind the stuff we check on.

The son of subtle details he'd pick up in postgraduate work, Ramsay thought. Oh yes, Kalvin's had himself a hidden agenda for a long, long time. A regular little intelligence service, he said aloud, if Showers wants it run that way.

She sniffed at the steaming ca.s.serole, gave a judicial nod, and placed it on the table.

Elite's first contract was directly through Kalvin; a real internal disaster, she admitted asthey sat down. You know how Harry Rand likes to walk around with a hand-held mike instead of standing behind a lectern with armored gla.s.s?

Ramsay snorted with amus.e.m.e.nt as he helped himself to fragments of pimiento, lamb, and cheese layered atop corn chips. It's the preacher in him, he said. A lot of us think it's as bush-league as Pop Warner ballgames, but it seems to work for him.

Kalvin wanted a gra.s.s-roots opinion before the Presidential campaign, she said. Tate thought the habit would be a turn-off for a national audience. I'm afraid he cooked our data a little to bolster that opinion, she said ruefully, but it got harder to cook as time went on. The public just plain liked the President's style and Tate finally had to admit that, or provide outright false data. Don't you breathe word of this to anyone, Alan. I'd be in serious trouble.

I didn't hear it, he said around a mouthful of delicious cholesterol, pantomiming a feeding frenzy. You cook food better than you cook data, he added.

Oh, I'm what they call a field a.n.a.lyst; what I really do, mostly, is jolly people into giving us free information. A lot of legwork, she shrugged.

You're highly qualified there, he leered, chewing happily.

I don't always like what I have to do. But it's for a good cause, she said. And where else could I earn oodles of money, and meet people like Alan Ramsay?

There's that. But what's the good cause?

She colored slightly; busied herself with her fork. Harr? President Rand is a fine man. I grant you he's no genius, but he's a decent person. I've been a supporter since before he ran for the senate.

Ramsay lowered his fork. You're kidding. You were hardly more than a kid.

And he was on the evangelical circuit. I went out of curiosity and? oh, I suppose you had to be there. To see him striding across in front of an audience, full of love and hope and anger and joy for us, it just? I guess it was something like a religious experience, she said. For three thousand people.

Ramsay began to eat again, nodding, chewing, thinking. That's a big audience. He saw her nod and went on, Did he use a wireless mike then?

I don't remem? oh, she said, grinning. No, the mike had a cord. He tripped over it once; pulled the jack out of the socket. I remember because it's the only time I ever saw Walter Kalvin on his knees, scrambling to fix it.

Probably still experimenting, Ramsay said, aloud but to himself. Then, snapping his attention to Pam and her entree, he took another helping. Quite a coincidence, your getting a job here and finding Rand's people are your clients, he said.

She looked at him steadily. It was no coincidence. And I'd rather not peer down a gift horse's throat, Alan. They both fell silent, savoring the meal, until Pam said, Aren't there some things about your job that it would be unprofessional of you to talk about?

Not many. Some, he admitted. Sure; a few. Same here. I wouldn't have shared any of this with you, especially considering the work you do, if I weren't sharing everything else with you. There are just some things I mustn't talk about.

Professionally.

Yes, professionally. What are you getting at?

At the last morsel in this dish, he said, smiling at her abruptly, sc.r.a.ping with his fork.

You're changing the subject. Finish what you were going to say.

I'm not sure, he said, but I know it would involve using your position to help me.

She reached out to touch his wrist gently, her gaze sad and steady. I have a commitment to you and Laurie now. That's not your decision, it's mine.

They sat in silence while Ramsay considered the ways that Pam might help. It was not conviction but desperation that made him ask, Pam, if I asked you to deliver a note to Kalvin personally, could you do it? After some thought, she nodded. My career would be on the line if he didn't like it. Tate's my boss, and Showers is in between them, she reminded.

Just an idea, he sighed. I'm not sure what I want to say. If Laurie comes to harm I'll blow you away during a press conference? Or more likely, Give me my kid now and I'll retire from the business. No, his best option for Laurie was to prove tractable, to do as the b.a.s.t.a.r.ds said and keep quiet for a month. Why a month?

He puzzled at that question fruitlessly, staring into s.p.a.ce until Pam insinuated her toes between his feet beneath the table. She stroked his calf, smiling, and presently he felt arousal for her? a miracle in these horrendous circ.u.mstances.

An hour later, after they had t.i.tillated each other through the kitchen cleanup and moved into his bedroom with busy hands, they lay spent on his bed. Perhaps not entirely spent, as she used one languid hand to stroke him to a pa.s.sable erection. Ah yes, she murmured, the potency of the press. Would you say I'm holding the wand of power, love?

I'll say anything you like if you promise not to stop.

Her chuckle was salacious in the shadowed room. Then, as they lay together, she whispered into his ear: You're right, Alan. Don't trust anybody; not old friends, not even me entirely. But I'd like to know that you've written down everything for posterity, just in case.

Mumbling: So you can read it?

No. Because it might keep you alive.

I already did, he said, kissing the long curve of her throat. He felt her relax then.

They were half-asleep when the call came. Ramsay bounded into his study, grabbed the phone. Ramsay here; h.e.l.lo? h.e.l.lo? This time he heard no adult voice, but a series of clatters and clicks and then, unmistakable, Laurie's voice: Daddy, she wants me to tell you what I saw on the news.

Click, pause, click. There was this story about a train jumping off, uh, derailing. Click, pause, click. She tapes this so you'll know I'm okay but, click, pause. Click. I love you, Daddy and Mommy.

He tried to reply but the line went dead. Obviously, someone had taped and deleted some of Laurie's message.

Just as obviously, Laurie could watch NBN's local newscasts. That meant she was within the local coverage area, and she did not sound as if she was badly injured. h.e.l.l, she could be on the other side of Baltimore, he raged.

Pam stood in the doorway, fetchingly disheveled, worry lines robbing her face of youth.

He ran his phone recorder playback through its speaker for her; watched while she gnawed her fist in concentration and dismay. She doesn't know about her mother. They may even have some mercy.

He nodded, sitting at his desk now, laying his cheek against her flank as she moved near. Maybe it won't be as h.e.l.lish for Laurie as I thought, he said.

Unspoken between them was the knowledge that his own daily routines were going to be utter and absolute h.e.l.l.

EIGHT.

The theatre in the west wing's bas.e.m.e.nt had originally been quite small; scarcely larger than the Cabinet Room upstairs, dwarfed by the nearby Situation Room with its communications equipment. The enlarging of the theatre had been Kalvin's idea. The long narrow stage and the new ranks of plush seats, he had told Harrison Rand, would give the President the kind of room he needed when addressing a sizeable group in a private setting.

Standing in the Situation Room with Rand, Kalvin tucked a gray wand under one arm as he reached up to straighten his President's tie. But it won't matter how he looks if he doesn't follow my script, Kalvin thought.

Kalvin had spent years trying to account for every significant variable which created that public paragon, that potential monster, the charismatic leader. The n.a.z.is had one thing ba.s.s-ackwards: you didn't begin with the characteristics of the leader, you began with the typical follower. The same voice qualities that hypnotized most people couldgenerate doubt, or even subconscious hostility, in a few. The chief trick was to find what won over the maximum number of followers? especially in one-person, one-vote democracies where the decisions are made by a majority of meat, and not necessarily a majority of informed opinions. In 1930's Germany, a certain stridency in tone had done wonders. Americans, half a century later, responded better to deep resonances, among other things.

Kalvin had worked long and hard to identify those other things. He had microminiaturized a suitcase full of tubes and wires into a package that fitted into that gray wand under his arm, and finally made the whole thing wireless after a few harrowing accidents. Studying the latest advances in voice stress a.n.a.lysis, which often revealed when a speaker doubted his own truthfulness, Kalvin had added defeat circuits that simply eliminated those tonal tipoffs the stress a.n.a.lyzer was designed to identify.

And because Kalvin never entirely trusted Harry Rand or anyone else to follow orders exactly? to stick to the script, as it were? Kalvin slaved the Donnersprache circuits to a wireless enable-disable unit in his own pocket. The instant Rand varied from what Kalvin wanted to hear, Harry Rand became only a regional orator, the mike only an amplifier, the formidable Donnersprache circuits only sleeping sorcery.

And when Kalvin chose to enable those circuits again, then President Harrison Rand's mighty voice flowed through artificial channels to emerge with rhythms and cadences and resonant tones of self-a.s.surance that most. listeners found irresistible. And all he knows is, whenever he deviates from my script, his results are poor. That's powerful reinforcement to a man who wants to be loved, thought Kalvin. Still holding the wireless mike under his arm, Kalvin tucked the Presidential tie in, nodded at his handiwork? all three-piece-suited, two hundred and thirty pounds of it? and said, You're letter-perfect on your speech?

You know I'm a quick study, Walt. Quit worrying, you just make sure that bunch of congressmen is ready for their minds to be changed.

I checked the viewport; Showers got them seated a couple of minutes ago, Kalvin replied, and withdrew the wand from his armpit, handing it to the President. Don't forget your mike.

Rand took it, a device longer than most cordless mikes with a faint patina of use on its knurling from Presidential palms after all this time. Look, I don't need this thing for forty or fifty people, he said. I know folks kid me about my old-fashioned delivery. Might not hurt to modernize my image a little.

It would ruin you, Kalvin said, understating the truth. Anyhow, you need amplifiers in a room that size.

So why not use a smaller room?

Because then you couldn't use your own special style. Peripatetic, remember?

Walkin' around while you talk. Aristotle. Sure I remember, but if I didn't do it, I wouldn't have to use this thing, he said, shaking the microphone like a party noisemaker.

Please don't do that, Kalvin said quickly, reaching out to the wand. You could bang it against something. Wouldn't want to damage your lucky mike. Your lucky mike,'' Rand corrected. You're the one who got all pale and sweaty that time in Atlanta when I?

My lucky mike, then. Kalvin had invented that explanation years before after his own nervous near-collapse when Rand, speaking live at a Georgia fundraiser, mislaid the device that had taken Kalvin years to develop from its ancient German prototype. They had found it in the pocket of a janitor, an hour later. Humor me, Harry. It's part of you by now and we don't want to change a winning combination.

They began to walk to the reinforced doors, a staffer opening a door smartly, getting a nod from the President. As the two men walked down the hall toward the theatre, Rand tucked the wand into an inside coat pocket sewn especially for this use. How many representatives you think will change their minds from this little chitchat, Walt?

Never possible to say exactly; they're a cynical lot, but you could swing half of this group, maybe twenty, if you do it like this in a controlled situation.

More than one-on-one by phone?

Kalvin knew that the magic of Donnersprache depended on excellent fidelity, and you could not depend on the fidelity of someone else's telephone receiver. It often worked, but you could not depend on it working well enough, often enough. Trust me, Harry; this is better. Brings out the old charisma, he said, patting the President's arm, opening the door for his usual informal, bigger-than-life entrance.

Walter Kalvin watched the reaction of forty congressional representatives, each summoned because he opposed the new Federal Media Council, each beginning to slip beneath the spell of the moment, each impressed with his own importance, having been summoned to such a friendly confrontation by the President of the United States. A position of highly visible power, Kalvin knew, carried its own magic.

No one noticed when Walter Kalvin sat down, hands jammed in pockets, in a last-row seat. That was the way Kalvin liked it. He toyed with the memocomp in his righthand pocket, paying close attention to Harry Rand some of the time but to forty congressmen most of the time. Harry was right, Kalvin thought, he was as quick to learn his lines as most professional actors. It would not be necessary to press the special b.u.t.tons that could remotely enable or disable the mike's Donnersprache circuits, at least not until after the sermon. Actually, the only times Kalvin needed to disable those circuits was when Harry Rand took it on himself to cajole or bl.u.s.ter his way into a position that put him in opposition to Kalvin himself. When that happened, the circuits got disabled.

And so did President Harrison Rand's credibility, without the invisible, silent thunder of Donnersprache.

Kalvin watched and listened as Harry Rand strode across the slender raised stage, thinking that the man had never been in better form. Videotapes of the audience response would tell him more later. And of course, there would be another such meeting with an a.s.sortment of the opposing members of the Senate. It was all going according to plan, Kalvin decided. They might not have to eliminate anybody else, not even that guy Ramsay.

At least, not until after the Federal Media Council became reality. Then they could ice the b.a.s.t.a.r.d, him and anybody else they chose, because even if a killing went wrong, thescrewup wouldn't be a problem unless it became news. And nothing would be news if Walter Kalvin, chairman of that council, said it must not be news.

NINE.

The abuses of Laurie Ramsay were many, though most were no worse than a slap. It was the s.e.xual abuse that would leave invisible scars. The worst part of it, Laurie found, was the cloying, sickening pleasure she felt for brief moments in Johnnie's hands. Forced to rely on her own strengths far more than ever before? even at summer camp? the girl made great use of subtlety.

Johnnie kept treating her like a little kid? Very well, Laurie would take tiny revenges by acting the part. In the phrase of Laurie's school chums: sandbag the b.i.t.c.h. Cold water was the only amenity of the kitchen and bathroom, and Laurie's ch.o.r.es included dishes.

Spilling detergent, knocking the propane stove into the sink, and clumsiness to the point of idiocy became Laurie's tricks. She quickly learned that she had no hope of moving the heavy drapes away from the clerestory windows, even in the kitchen: the process was noisy and Johnnie's hearing was good. The sounds from outside included birds and occasional aircraft, but no car traffic. Though Laurie was never permitted to climb up and glance out, Johnnie pulled the drapes aside for natural light during the days, performed indifferently as cook, and meted out swift punishment for 'accidents.'

Johnnie's weapons were open-handed slaps and viselike pinches. Two things seemed to provoke Johnnie to attack the girl s.e.xually, and Laurie soon learned the ugly pattern.

One thing was any behavior that enraged the woman enough to spank. The other was binding Laurie's wrists, ankles, and mouth with adhesive tape prior to Johnnie's nightly disappearances. When Johnnie returned, she seemed tempted by Laurie's helplessness.

And always, after the despised caresses, Johnnie would reward herself with tequila. The woman had brought two quarts of the stuff and gulped it straight from the bottle.

Laurie came to think of s.e.x as horrid punishment, but in a.n.a.lyzing her captivity she also found real wisdom. It was clear that Johnnie had a child's ethic: full attention to what was due to her, little attention to what was due from her. If Laurie could be forced to do every ch.o.r.e, and to make no demands while Johnnie filled her days with TV and magazines, then Johnnie would not fill Laurie's days with so much anguish.

And one more thing entered Laurie's thoughts: weapons. If anything convertible to a weapon was bad, then Johnnie's hands should be confiscated. Laurie wished she could bring a bottle of tequila down on her captor's skull? which proved that Laurie's hands were potentially 'bad' too. And wasn't Laurie's deliberate clumsiness really a weapon? Itwas, in fact, Laurie's only weapon. Laurie began to wish she had a better one, something with which to defend herself against power both illegal and immoral.

Laurie had begun to question the tenets of pacifism. And to consider alternatives, and then to busy herself with empty food containers which, in camp, she'd learned to make into a tea set.

Johnnie saw her small captive making 'cake' from fireplace ash, and brewing 'tea' in metal cans, and Johnnie returned to her magazines with a shrug. Let the little b.a.s.t.a.r.d play childish games, she seemed to think, so long as she was obedient and neat about it.

Johnnie did not seem to care that, for the silent, intent Laurie, it was more than a game.

TEN.

For Ramsay, the first few days of Laurie's captivity became a challenge to sanity. He canceled the appointment with Magnuson, fully aware that he was choosing Laurie over the future of his country. He found anodyne in his work, driving himself in solemn intensity, telling himself that 'they' would return Laurie in a month? and not believing it.

Incredibly, not even the scrofulous tabloid press penetrated the cone of silence around the death of Kathleen Ramsay, which was duly announced by Lieutenant Corwin as suffered in her Georgetown home during a break-in attempt. Aside from a few of Kathleen's friends who had never liked Ramsay and did not intend to start now, Ramsay noted that Corwin and two of his men were virtually the only others to attend Kathleen's funeral. What's really galling, Ramsay said to Corwin later, as they walked between rows of headstones, is that she was bright, useful, a good mother. And she's been put away without a ripple of suspicion anywhere.

Put it in plain terms, Ramsay: you mean she's gone, and her murderers are running loose, Corwin corrected. That's what happens when the people who could help us, won't.

Sure; I talk to you, and they kill Laurie by inches. Strain made his voice tight, almost shrill. She calls me every night, Corwin, did you know that?

Corwin knew. Did Ramsay know that the calls came from different directions? Arlington, Silver Spring, Cheverly. Audio a.n.a.lysis suggested that Laurie's messages were first sent from some single location as scrambled transmissions over ordinary phone lines, to telephone booths s.p.a.ced around the Washington area. Then someone would call Ramsay and play the tape. The calls were never long enough for police to fix the exact location.All the earmarks of very, very organized crime, Corwin said. Maybe politically organized.

If you said the right things, Mr. Ramsay, I could bring in the Feds. But I won't force you.

If Corwin was part of it, he was role-playing and the h.e.l.l with him. If he wasn't, maybe he could be pushed back to arm's length. Ramsay asked, What if it's some lunatic group of the Feds themselves?