"Garth is not sick," Tommy Carling replied somewhat petulantly. "He's probably the healthiest person on the face of the earth."
"You've got to be kidding me."
"I admit I-we-may have handled things badly, and that maybe I should have pressed Garth to contact you and your parents; but I told you that I was very concerned about what could happen if Dr. Slycke ever got hold of Garth again."
"And I told you that Slycke was dead."
"I didn't know that, Mongo. It's the truth; if I had known, I would have handled things much differently. Do you care to tell me what happened to him?"
"Why don't you tell me how you come to be here with Garth and Marl Braxton in this super-Salvation Army operation."
"The Salvation Army totally supports our work here, Mongo, and they might not think much of your attitude. You tell me your story first. How did Dr. Slycke die?"
Watching Carling's face very carefully, I told him what had happened up in the clinic the night I had gone there in response to Slycke's phone call. When I had finished, Carling tugged absently at his earring and shook his head.
"That's incredible, Mongo; you were incredibly lucky to get out of there alive."
"So I've been told."
"I didn't know about any of this. Naturally, since the clinic is a secret facility, news of Dr. Slycke's death wouldn't have been in the newspapers-even if I'd been reading them."
"Your turn, Tommy. The three of you took off even before Slycke called me, which means you must have snuck Garth and Braxton out from under Slycke's nose."
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Garth never had any kind of relapse, Mongo. Slycke was lying."
"I'd gathered that," I said dryly.
"You talked to Slycke after you talked to me, about the same thing-the possibility of removing Garth from the clinic. You shouldn't have done that. It was why I didn't plan to report the conversation to Dr. Slycke; I knew it would make him very nervous. In fact, he panicked. I'm not sure why he reacted as severely as he did, but my guess is that he was under pressure-as you suspected might happen-from his superiors in Washington to keep Garth under close observation at all times, in order to monitor the effects of NPPD poisoning." Carling paused, seeming to study the opposite wall for a few moments, then continued: "Still, he was so upset that you might even be thinking about taking Garth out. I'm not sure I understand it. How could his superiors hold him responsible for potential actions of yours which you had every right to make? It doesn't make sense."
"Slycke's problems weren't with the D.I.A., Tommy, and they weren't the ones putting the pressure on him. He was an informant for the K.G.B., and they had their hooks into him good."
Carling's eyes opened wide, and he blinked slowly. "What?"
"Slycke was passing on information to the Russians, as well as taking orders from them. It was the K.G.B. making him nervous."
"Ahh," Carling said distantly, once again focusing his gaze on the wall behind me. "That could certainly explain a few other things."
"Like what?"
"I'd told you that Charles Slycke was a good doctor-and I sincerely believed that. It was why what he was planning to do came as such a shock to me."
"What was he planning to do?"
"He was going to institute a clearly experimental-and potentially dangerous-drug therapy program with Garth. There was absolutely no reason to do that, and it was unethical; he planned to do it in secret, without informing either Garth or you, or even trying to get permission. That made it illegal, as well."
"Just what kind of a program was this?"
"He was going to medicate Garth with a whole series of very powerful psychotropics. In effect, from what I could understand, his only motive was simply to see what might happen. I couldn't believe my ears when he told me what he was planning to do, or my eyes when I saw the medication orders on the daily sheet."
"He came up with this plan just before he barred me from the clinic?"
"Yes. Even a layman could see that Garth had made tremendous progress in a very short time. He wasn't violent, certainly no threat to himself or others, and he was lucid. Under no circumstances would any responsible psychiatrist want to do absolutely anything but continue to observe patiently, listen, and perhaps counsel. Yet Dr. Slycke was planning to saturate Garth with these drugs. I couldn't make any sense out of it-and then I remembered some of the concerns you'd expressed to me during the course of our conversation outside on the grass. I realized then that you'd been absolutely right. I also understood then why you'd been barred from the clinic. I guess I panicked."
"Why didn't you call and tell me about this when it happened, Tommy?"
"There was so little time. I was to begin administering doses to Garth-in any way I could manage-that very evening. I didn't know if you'd be able to stop Slycke, or what would happen to Garth, or me, if I tried to stop him. I'm just a nurse, and he could have ordered me off the premises out-of-hand-and had me locked up, to boot, as a suspected security risk. I was. . very upset. By that time, as I think you know, I'd become very attached to Garth-and to you, if I may say so. I just couldn't let Dr. Slycke do something that could destroy Garth's mind. So I did the only thing I could think of at the moment."
"You took Garth out."
"Yes," Tommy Carling replied quietly. "I just had to do something. I hadn't even thought about what I was going to do afterward. . I just acted."
"Thank you, Tommy," I said simply. "Garth and I owe you more than we can repay."
"Oh, no," the other man said quickly-and then looked at me in a way that made me slightly uncomfortable. I'd seen a similar look before-on Marl Braxton's face, when he had started to talk about Garth. "It's I who owe the two of you. Garth is. . very special."
"How did Marl Braxton get to join the party?"
"I took him out with Garth. Garth wouldn't leave without him, and. . well, there just wasn't a lot of time to argue; I only had two or three minutes' leeway. If I didn't take Garth out then, the chances were slim that I would be able to do it at all before he was drugged."
"A hell of a big decision, Tommy."
"Yes," the male nurse replied simply.
"How did you know Braxton wouldn't kill you the moment you got them away from the clinic? For that matter, how do you know he still won't kill Garth or you one of these days?"
Carling shook his head. "Garth assured me that Marl would be fine, and that he wouldn't cause any trouble. It's hard to explain, Mongo, but somehow I knew instinctively that Garth was right. He was."
"So far."
"He was right."
"Garth has an apartment." I said tightly. "I happen to be living in it. Why didn't you bring him back there?"
"For the same reason I didn't contact you; I was afraid the authorities would catch us, and somehow force Garth to go back to Slycke. Besides, Garth didn't want to go back there. He told me he wanted nothing more to do with anything in his past.
"We ended up in a flophouse not too far from here. I had — some cash with me, but it wasn't going to go very far with the three of us." Carling paused, spread his hands on the surface of the desk. "Mongo, I don't really know how to explain easily all that's happened since then. Four months is such a short time, but. ."
"Just tell me what happened, Tommy."
"On that very first night, Garth started his work-talking to and comforting some of the others in the flophouse, walking the streets and talking to drunks, bag people, people living in cardboard boxes. Those people responded to him the same way the patients in the clinic responded to him. Garth explained to me that he had to do these things, that it was the only way he could keep from crying.