«Thank you. Please, sit down.» Trevayne looked over at his secretary as she started out. «Hold my calls, will you, Marge? And close the door, please.» He returned to his chair as Roderick Bruce sat down in front of the desk.
«These offices are certainly off the beaten track, aren’t they?»
«I apologize; I hope the trip wasn’t inconvenient. I’d have been happy to meet you in town; it’s why I suggested lunch.»
«No trouble. I wanted to scout this place for myself; a lot of people are talking about it. Funny, I don’t see any racks or whips or iron maidens.»
«We keep that equipment locked up in a back room. More centralized that way.»
«Good answer; I’ll use it.» Bruce took out a small notebook—a very small notebook, as if scaled to his size—and jotted down several words as Trevayne laughed. «You never can tell when a good direct quote will come in handy.»
«It wasn’t particularly good.»
«All right, then, humanizing. A lot of Kennedy’s quips were just as much humanizing as they were bright, you know.»
«Which one?»
«Jack’s. Bobby’s were labored, thought out. Jack was instinctively human … and humorous in a vulnerable way.»
«I’m in good company.»
«Not bad. But you’re not running for anything, so it doesn’t matter, does it?»
«You took out the notebook, I didn’t.»
«And it’s going to stay out, Mr. Trevayne… Shall we talk about four submarines, each costing roughly one hundred and eighty million apiece, currently boondoggled in dry dock? Seven hundred and twenty million dollars’ worth of nothing… You know it, I know it. Why shouldn’t the people who paid for it know also?»
«Perhaps they should.»
Bruce hadn’t expected Trevayne’s reply. He shifted his position in the chair and crossed his short legs. Andy wondered for a second if the newsman’s feet were touching the floor.
«That’s very good, too. I won’t bother to write it down, because I’ll remember it.» Bruce folded the flap of his tiny notebook. «Then I assume you have no objection to my story.»
«To be perfectly frank with you, I have no objections at all. Others have; I don’t.»
«Then why did you want to see me?»
«To … plead their case, I guess.»
«I’ve turned them down. Why wouldn’t I turn you down?»
«Because I’m a disinterested party; I can objectify. I think you have sound reasons for making public a very expensive fiasco, and if I were you, I’d probably release it without hesitation. On the other hand, I don’t have your experience. I wouldn’t know where to draw the line between a necessary reporting of incompetence and invading the areas of national security. I might shed light on that part.»
«Oh, come on, Trevayne.» Roderick Bruce uncrossed his legs in annoyance. «I’ve heard that argument, and it won’t wash!»
«You’re sure of that?»
«For reasons more valid than you’d ever suspect.»
«If that’s the case, Mr. Bruce,» said Trevayne, taking out a pack of cigarettes, «you should have accepted my offer of lunch. We could have spent the rest of the meal in pleasant conversation. You don’t know it, but I’m an avid reader of yours. Cigarette?»
Roderick Bruce stared at Trevayne, his lower lip fallen from his mouth. Since he did not reach for a cigarette, Trevayne shook one out for himself and leaned back in his chair while lighting it.
«Jesus! You mean it,» said Bruce quietly.
«I certainly do. I … suspect … the valid reasons you refer to cover the areas of security. If so, and I know damned well you didn’t get where you are by lying in these matters, I can’t offer any further argument.»
«But my breaking it isn’t going to help you, is it?»
«No, it’s not. It’ll be one bitch of a hindrance, to tell you the truth. But that’s my problem, not yours.»
Bruce leaned slightly forward, his miniature frame somewhat ludicrous in the large leather chair. «You don’t have to have a problem… And I don’t care if the room is bugged.»
«If it’s what?» Trevayne sat up.
«I don’t care if we’re taped; I gather we’re not. I’ll trade you off, Trevayne… No hindrance from me; no problems with the New London mess. Simple trade. I’ll even give you a selection.»
«What the hell are you talking about?»
«We’ll start with yesterday.» Bruce lifted the right flap of his coat jacket and slowly reinserted his notebook. He did so stylistically, as if the action were symbolic of confidence. He held his gold pencil in his hands and revolved both ends between his fingers. «You spent an hour and twenty minutes at National District Statistics yesterday; from shortly after four to past closing. You requested the volumes for the states of California and Maryland for the periods covering the past eighteen months. Now, given time, my office could easily go through the books and probably find what you were researching, but let’s face it, there are several thousand pages and a couple of hundred thousand insertions. What interests me is that you did the legwork yourself. Not a secretary, not even an aide. You were playing close poker. What did you get?»
Trevayne tried to absorb Bruce’s words, the implications behind his words.
«You were the gray Pontiac. You followed me in a gray Pontiac.»
«Wrong, but interesting.»
«You were on Rhode Island Avenue, and then you were in Georgetown. Behind a knife-sharpening truck.»
«Sorry. Wrong again. If I want you followed, you’ll never know it. What did you go after at N.D.S.? That’s selection one. If it’s worth it, I’ll kill the sub story.»
Trevayne’s mind was still on the Pontiac. He’d call Webster at the White House as soon as he got rid of Bruce… He’d nearly forgotten about the Pontiac.
«No deal, Bruce. It’s not worth it, anyway. It was background.»
«All right, I’ll put my staff on the N.D.S. books. We’ll find it… Selection two. This is rougher. There’s a rumor that six weeks ago, after your somewhat spectacular appearance at the Senate hearing, you met with the old boy from Nebraska a few hours before the Fairfax accident; that you had harsh words. Is it true, and what was the substance?»
«The only person who could have heard that conversation was a man named Miller … Laurence Miller, as I recall. The chauffeur. Ask him. He’s told you this much, why not the rest?»
«He’s loyal to the old man. He was also taken care of with a bequest. He won’t say; claims he never listened to back-seat talk. There was too much of it.»
«No deal again. It was an honorable disagreement. If Miller tells you anything else, I’d question it if I were you.»
«You’re not me… One more selection; your last, Trevayne. If you cop out, I’ll be a big hindrance. I may even mention your attempt to ‘plead the case’ for suppression. How about that?»
«You’re a revolting little man. I don’t think I’ll read your column anymore.»
«Your words.»
«Followed by others; out of context.»
«Tell me about Bonner.»
«Paul Bonner?» Trevayne had an uncomfortable feeling that Roderick Bruce’s last selection was the real reason he was there. Not that the first two choices were innocuous—they weren’t, they were unacceptable—but the newsman’s voice betrayed a degree of intensity absent from his other questions; his threat more direct.
«Major Paul Bonner, no-middle-initial, serial number 158-3288; Special Forces, Intelligence Section, currently attached to Department of Defense. Recalled from Indochina, nineteen seventy after spending three months’ isolation in a military stockade—officer’s quarters, of course—awaiting court-martial. No interviews permitted; no information available. Except a happy little descriptive phrase coined by a general in Eye Corps: the ‘killer from Saigon.’ That’s the Bonner I’m referring to, Mr. Trevayne. And if you’re the avid reader of my work you say you are, you know I’ve stated that the mad Major should be locked up in Leavenworth, not walking the streets.»