«No, I’m not. I’m not dramatizing anything… I have to do exactly what you want me to do, don’t I? I have to go through with it… The only alternative I have is to disappear … and be hunted. Hunted by you and—if you’re right—by this Omega.»
Fassett returned Tanner’s look without a trace of deceit. Tanner had spoken the truth and both men knew it.
«It’s only six days. Six days out of a lifetime.»
4
Monday—8:05 P.M.
The flight from Dulles Airport to Newark seemed unreal. He wasn’t tired. He was terrified. His mind kept darting from one image to another, each visual picture pushing the previous one out into the distance. There were the sharp staring eyes of Laurence Fassett above the tape recorder’s turning reels. The drone of Fassett’s voice asking those interminable questions; then the voice growing louder and louder.
«Omega!»
And the faces of Bernie and Leila Osterman, Dick and Ginny Tremayne, Joe and Betty Cardone.
None of it made sense! He’d get to Newark and suddenly the nightmare would be over and he’d remember giving Laurence Fassett the public service features and signing the absent pages of the F.C.C. filing.
Only he knew he wouldn’t.
The hour’s ride from Newark to Saddle Valley was made in silence, the taxi driver taking his cue from his fare in the back seat who kept lighting cigarettes and who hadn’t answered him when he’d asked how the flight had been.
SADDLE VALLEY
VILLAGE INCORPORATED 1862
Welcome
Tanner stared at the sign as it caught the cab’s headlights. As it receded he could only think of the words «Chasm of Leather.»
Unreal.
Ten minutes later the taxi pulled up to his house. He got out and absently handed the driver the fare agreed upon.
«Thanks, Mr. Tanner,» said the driver, leaning over the seat to take the money through the window.
«What? What did you say?» demanded John Tanner.
«I said ‘Thanks, Mr. Tanner.’»
Tanner leaned down and gripped the door handle, pulling the door open with all his strength.
«How did you know my name? You tell me how you knew my name!»
The taxi driver could see beads of perspiration rolling down his passenger’s face, the crazy look in the man’s eyes. A weirdo, thought the driver. He carefully moved his left hand toward the floor beneath his feet. He always kept a thin lead pipe there.
«Look, Mac,» he said, his fingers around the pipe. «You don’t want nobody to use your name, take the sign off your lawn.»
Tanner stepped back and looked over his shoulder. On the lawn was the wrought-iron lantern, a weatherproof hurricane lamp hanging from a crossbar by a chain. Above the lamp, reflected in the light, were the words:
THE TANNERS
22 ORCHARD DRIVE
He’d looked at that lamp and those words a thousand times. The Tanners. 22 Orchard Drive. At that moment they, too, seemed unreal. As if he had never seen them before.
«I’m sorry, fella. I’m a little on edge. I don’t like flying.» He closed the door as the driver began rolling up the window. The driver spoke curtly.
«Take the train then, Mister. Or walk, for Christ’s sake!»
The taxi roared off, and Tanner turned and looked at his house. The door opened. The dog bounded out to meet him. His wife stood in the hall light, and he could see her smile.
5
Tuesday—3:30 A.M. California Time
The white French telephone, with its muted Hollywood bell, had rung at least five times. Leila thought sleepily that it was foolish to have it on Bernie’s side of the bed. It never woke him, only her.
She nudged her husband’s ribs with her elbow. «Darling… Bernie. Bernie. It’s the phone.»
«What?» Osterman opened his eyes, confused. «The phone? Oh, the Goddamn phone. Who can hear it?»
He reached over in the darkness and found the thin cradle with his fingers.
«Yes?… Yes, this is Bernard Osterman… Long distance?» He covered the phone with his hand and pushed himself up against the headboard. He turned toward his wife. «What time is it?»
Leila snapped on her bedside lamp and looked at the table clock. «Three-thirty. My God!»
«Probably some bastard on that Hawaiian series. It’s not even midnight there yet.» Bernie was listening at the phone. «Yes, operator, I’m waiting… It’s very long distance, honey. If it is Hawaii, they can put that producer on the typewriter; we’ve had it. We never should have touched it… Yes, operator? Please hurry, will you?»
«You said you wanted to see those islands without a uniform on, remember?»
«I apologize… Yes, operator, this is Bernard Osterman, damn it! Yes? Yes? Thank you, operator… Hello? I can hardly hear you. Hello?… Yes, that’s better. Who’s this?… What? What did you say?… Who is this? What’s your name? I don’t understand you. Yes, I heard you, but I don’t understand… Hello?… Hello! Wait a minute! I said wait a minute!» Osterman shot up and flung his legs over the side of the bed. The blankets came after him and fell on the floor at his feet. He began punching the center bar on the white French telephone. «Operator! Operator! The Goddamn line’s dead!»
«Who was it? Why are you shouting? What did they say?»
«He … the son of a bitch grunted like a bull. He said, he said we were to watch out for the … Tan One. That’s what he said. He made sure I heard the words. The Tan One. What the hell is that?»
«The what?»
«The Tan One! That’s all he kept repeating!»
«It doesn’t make sense… Was it Hawaii? Did the operator say where the call came from?»
Osterman stared at his wife in the dim light of the bedroom. «Yes. I heard that clearly. It was overseas… It was Lisbon. Lisbon, Portugal.»
«We don’t know anyone in Portugal!»
«Lisbon, Lisbon, Lisbon …» Osterman kept repeating the name quietly to himself. «Lisbon. Neutral. Lisbon was neutral.»
«What do you mean?»
«Tan One …»
«Tan … tan. Tanner. Could it be John Tanner? John Tanner!»
«Neutral!»
«It’s John Tanner,» said Leila quietly.
«Johnny?… What did he mean, ‘Watch out’? Why should we watch out? Why place a call at three-thirty in the morning?»
Leila sat up and reached for a cigarette. «Johnny’s got enemies. The San Diego waterfront still hurts because of him.»
«San Diego, sure! But Lisbon?»
«Daily Variety said last week that we’re going to New York,» continued Leila, inhaling smoke deeply. «That we’d probably stay with our ex-neighbors, the Tanners.»
«So?»
«Perhaps we’re too well advertised.» She looked at her husband.
«Maybe I’ll call Johnny.» Osterman reached for the phone.
Leila grabbed his wrist. «Are you out of your mind?»
Osterman lay back down.
Joe opened his eyes and glanced at his watch: six-twenty-two. Time to get up, have a short workout in his gym and perhaps walk over to the Club for an hour’s practice on the golf range.
He was an early riser, Betty the opposite. She would sleep till noon whenever she had the chance. They had two double beds, one for each of them, because Joe knew the debilitating effects of two separate body temperatures under the same set of covers. The benefits of a person’s sleep were diminished by nearly fifty percent when he shared a bed all night with somebody else. And since the purpose of the marriage bed was exclusively sexual, there was no point in losing the benefits of sleep.
A pair of double beds was just fine.
He finished ten minutes on the exercycle and five with seven-and-a-half-pound handbells. He looked through the thick glass window of the steam bath and saw that the room was ready.