“That’s what I’m worried about,” Forsyth said. “If people in the government have secret drugs, then they can take away anybody’s rights at any time by making you think a certain way. By changing your mind. Why, they can even make you crazy, right?”
Silver’s eyes narrowed again, as if he was figuring Forsyth’s angle. “I tried some of that stuff. I can’t remember what it was like.”
Dr. Redfern’s face furrowed in deep concern and solemn sorrow. Forsyth was sure she’d refined that look in a mirror.
“Did Dr. Morgan ever mention a drug called Seethe?” Forsyth said.
“No, but it sounds cool,” Silver said. “Upper?”
“It doesn’t exist,” he replied. “But we got reason to think Dr. Morgan may be under a bit of…strain. As you can likely appreciate, her previous post as a presidential advisor means her actions reflect on all of us. If she needs help, she deserves the finest treatment and…” Forsyth turned to Dr. Redfern. “What did you call that?”
“Continuum of care,” she said, pleased to contribute.
“She didn’t talk about Seethe, but she did seem a little freaked out,” Silver said. “I offered her some weed to help her chill, but she said she didn’t do drugs.” He gave a sudden bark of laughter. “Doesn’t do drugs. Now that’s what I call crazy, man.”
“Thank you for the information. Mr. Silver,” Forsyth said, rising from his chair. “I’ll be sure to put in a good word for you with the federal prosecutors.”
“But this wasn’t an interrogation, right? If it was, I’d have had a lawyer and stuff, right?” As they retreated, he raised his voice to yell at their backs. “Unless my lawyer’s in on it, too.”
After the guard let them out, Dr. Redfern said, “We have more secret government drug conspiracies per square foot than any facility in the country, it seems.”
Forsyth gave an understanding smile, one full of paternal concern and a veiled promise of support. “Just between you and me, I think it’s the aliens and their little mind-scrambling ray guns.”
Dr. Redfern granted him a coy and unprofessional titter.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Roland checked the entire cabin, which wasn’t large, but he had to be careful not to arouse Wendy’s suspicions. The cabin was basically one open floor with a loft bedroom. While Wendy collected painting supplies for her afternoon session, Roland searched under the bed and the tiny closet.
He wasn’t sure what he was looking for, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that someone had been in the cabin. It didn’t make sense, because they hadn’t been anywhere except for their usual afternoon walk. They would have heard a car on the long gravel driveway, and the remote rural area held little attraction for burglars and thieves.
His laptop was on the table where he’d left it, and they didn’t have a television or other items easily pawned for cash. And they certainly didn’t have any money or jewelry.
The gun.
He jogged toward the loft stairs, nearly slamming into Wendy at the landing.
“Hey!” she said, gathering her paints in her arms.
He ran to the bedside table, cursing himself for letting down his guard. He should have been carrying the gun on the walk. However close or far away, somebody was watching them. And they could be very close.
“What are you freaking out about?” Wendy called from below.
“Shh,” he hissed, sliding open the table drawer. And there it was.
He pulled out the gun as Wendy joined him in the loft. “Did you see the fox?”
“Yeah.” He hurried back down to the open door and gazed into the woods, feeling a little stupid. A breeze played through the leaves, making a sound like faint laughter.
After a moment, he sensed Wendy behind him. “Maybe you should practice with that thing,” she said. “You’re not going to get many more chances.”
She nudged past him and he made room for her, looking at the. 38 revolver. As she spread her paint tubes around the easel, he glanced back at the table.
The laptop.
It was still there, but was it in the exact same position he’d left it? He tried to recall his last online activity. He’d been working on some lettering for a proposal. That had been before lunch.
Roland opened the laptop and powered it from its sleep. The Photoshop file came up, just as he’d last saved it. He knew the hard drive contained fingerprints of all commands the computer had ever performed, but such a search was well beyond his technical skills.
He looked at the USB ports on the side. Someone could have slipped a zip drive in and quickly downloaded his files.
But why? Maybe Wendy’s right. You’re getting paranoid.
But the e-mails were real. Even if it was the aftereffects of Seethe that were making him paranoid, that didn’t change the fact that someone knew about the Monkey House. And probably that he was a murderer.
National Clandestine Service, Burchfield, the enemy within.
God, grant me the serenity to Ah, fuck it.
He went out on the porch, the gun concealed in his pocket. Wendy made graceful strokes with her brush, powerful and confident gashes of dark red. She was in one of her moods.
Maybe it was guilt, subconsciously revealing itself in the figure huddled in a dark corner.
“Wendy?”
“Just a minute,” she said in that distracted, annoyed manner of the self-absorbed artist. She’d changed her style, slapping out lines and curls in a type of calligraphy. She worked until she was satisfied with the red, then she dabbed her brush in a jar of water.
She turned and put an impatient hand on her hip, the brush dripping onto the porch. “I hate it when you interrupt me.”
“This is important.”
“So is this.” She stabbed the brush toward the painting. “I’m getting close, I can feel it. What I’m trying to say.”
“I know what you’re looking for in there.”
She laughed. “You’re not going to start that stuff about conspiracies, are you?”
He wanted to grab her by the shoulders and shake her awake, describe how the drugs slept inside her like a pair of evil twins, one committing dark deeds and the other enabling. But his few attempts at honesty had ended with his feeling slightly unhinged, like a drunk emerging from a blackout in total denial of all the accompanying sins.
“No,” he said. “I was just wondering what you were painting.”
“What I’m always painting,” she said. “The monkey we left behind.”
“I see that. Can I ask you something?”
Wendy made a pantomime of looking around to see if he might be talking to anyone else. “Just between you and me?”
“Yeah. I got an e-mail yesterday. And another one this morning.”
“You get lots of e-mails.”
“The first said, ‘Every four hours or else.’” He watched her face to see if her expression was any different this time.
“I know. That book cover you’re working on.” She appeared bemused but slightly annoyed at having her work interrupted.
He tried the next one on her. “‘Surely you didn’t think we could let you live, after what happened.’”
“Is that from the book, too?”
Wendy was genuinely confused. Roland relaxed a little, willing to let her off the hook. Of all the survivors of the Monkey House, she was the most detached and innocent. Alexis had explained the drugs caused individualized reactions, not surprising considering Briggs had been scrambling with a big chemical spatula, but even Alexis didn’t seem to remember the real effects of Seethe and Halcyon.
Roland sure as hell did. Because he could still feel them inside his skull, fighting for control. Seethe commanded him to wipe that naive look off his wife’s face forever, because the mask disguised all her hideous, carnal behavior. Halcyon kneaded his memories like Play-Doh until he was no longer sure exactly which sins she’d committed.
He wondered if his alcoholism had created a special response to the two drugs. He often thought of his alcoholism as a living entity, a shadow creature lurking inside him and compelling him toward self-destruction. His addictive nature might have opened up inviting paths, and just as an alcoholic was one drink away from a lifelong binge, lying might be keeping the drugs active inside him.