Gurney complied.
“Now extend your legs straight out in front of you.”
Again Gurney complied. The movement revealed the bottom half inch of the ankle holster. He expected Landon to approach him to remove the gun he would believe was there. Instead, Landon told him to drag the heavy coffee table across his extended legs and place his hands on top of the table. He did so, discovering that the position was an effective way of making it impossible for him to reach the holster.
Landon looked pleased, then adopted a quizzical expression. “What were those initials you mentioned?”
“TIS. Trance-induced suicide. The program Sylvan Marschalk leaked to the press. The leak that got him assassinated.”
“That druggie traitor a hero of yours?”
“Never met the man.”
“But you think his death was a great loss to the world? Let me set you straight. When a little shit like Sylvan Marschalk imperils a program that could save thousands of American lives, he forfeits his own. There’s no right under God or the Constitution to recklessly weaken our defenses in a time of war. Let me make this perfectly clear. We are at war.”
“And Barlow Tarr was the enemy?”
“Tarr was a distraction.”
“And my wife? Is she the enemy?”
“You and your wife chose to support the wrong side.”
“You mean we were delaying Richard Hammond’s confession?”
“You were getting between your country and an individual who was a potential strategic asset. You were warned. More than once.”
“I assume Hammond was identified as a potential strategic asset because you believed he could induce suicide, a technique you and your friends would kill for.”
Landon said nothing. His expression was distant and emotionless.
“So when you heard that someone hypnotized by Hammond later complained about nightmares that made him want to kill himself, and then he actually did kill himself—and when that happened not once but four times—you assumed the TIS problem had been solved. Now, if only you could get Hammond to explain how he’d done it. You didn’t give a damn about getting him to confess that he’d done it. It was all about getting him to confess how he’d done it. Too bad he had nothing to confess. Too bad you were wrong. Too bad you have to clean up the mess. You wouldn’t want anyone back at the agency to find out what a godawful error you’d made—that you’d mistaken Steckle’s con job for the real thing.”
Gurney made this speech in a relaxed, confident, almost amused voice. He knew he was treading a perilous line between provoking rage and planting a seed of uncertainty. But perilous lines were part of the game.
Landon’s expression betrayed nothing.
Gurney extemporized. “Speaking of con jobs—you might want to look at some photos I have.”
Madeleine’s advice came to mind. Just open the door a crack.
“Where are these photos?”
“On a USB drive.”
“Where?”
“In my pocket.”
Gurney pointed to his right jacket pocket, which, in his seated position on the floor, was just above the edge of the coffee table.
Landon gave him a long appraising look.
“Shall I toss it to you?” asked Gurney. “Or do you want to come and get it yourself?”
Landon hesitated. Then he took a step closer and aimed his pistol at Gurney’s throat. “Slowly remove the drive from your pocket. Very slowly.”
Looking as anxious and defenseless as he could, Gurney reached slowly into his pocket.
In a single smooth movement he gripped the Beretta and, without removing it from his jacket, pointed it in the direction of Landon and began firing.
He wasn’t sure which round hit the man or where it hit him; but in the midst of the six-shot burst the man emitted a feral yowl and lurched backward into the corridor. By the time Gurney managed to heave the weighty coffee table off his legs, get to his feet, and stumble to the door with the Beretta in one hand and the Maglite in the other, the dark corridor was silent. He swept the light back and forth, but there was no sign of Landon.
He switched off the flashlight to avoid becoming an easy target and felt his way along the corridor to his own door. He unlocked and opened it.
Just inside, in the faint kerosene lamplight, he found Madeleine—wide-eyed, teeth clenched, with an iron poker drawn back like a baseball bat, ready to swing. She stared at him for a good five seconds before taking a breath and relaxing enough to lower the poker.
After telling her as quickly as he could what had happened, he went back to Landon’s room and retrieved the man’s laptops, smartphones, and gun cabinet.
Then he reloaded the Beretta’s magazine, barricaded their door, and rebuilt the fire.
The wind was howling fiercely now, the blizzard had finally arrived in full force, and there was nothing more they could do until daylight came.
CHAPTER 59
Sleep was impossible. There was too much to worry about, think about, plan for.
In a way, from an intellectual point of view, the case was over. The most perplexing questions had been answered, the major deceptions had been exposed. The puzzle had been solved. But a god-awful mess had been created along the way.
Bureaucratic and career imperatives were likely to make the mess bigger before it got smaller. The likelihood of obtaining any clarity or accountability from the forces associated with Norris Landon was in the neighborhood of zero. If those forces were indeed part of the CIA, zero would be an optimistic estimate. And BCI’s appetite would be minimal for any re-investigation that would make their first approach to the case appear fanciful at best.
From an emotional point of view, things were perhaps the least settled.
Through the whole restless night he and Madeleine huddled together on the couch in their ski clothes facing the fire. The groaning and creaking of the old building kept Gurney on edge, kept him speculating on the condition, whereabouts, and intentions of Landon.
The speculation was circular and endless. As were his thoughts about Colin Bantry’s place in Madeleine’s life, about her ability to recover from the shock of the things she’d seen, about the greed and ruthlessness of Austen Steckle, about the twisted history of the Galls, and about the delusional obsessions of those who hated America and those who claimed to love it.
A thought he’d had many times before came to him now with renewed power: God save us from our saviors.
From time to time he added a log to the fire. From time to time Madeleine sat up and stretched into one of her yoga positions.
Oddly, with so much to discuss, they spoke hardly at all.
At the first light of dawn they both began to doze.
Moments later they were awakened by a heavy mechanical rumbling.
Trying to place it, Gurney realized it was coming from outside the lodge. He slipped into his boots, removed the chair he’d jammed under the knob of the balcony door, and stepped out into the icy wind.
The sound was getting louder. The source, he discovered, was a big yellow truck that was just turning onto the lake road in the direction of the lodge. Mounted on the front of the truck was the largest industrial snow blower he’d ever seen—with an intake opening at least ten feet wide and five feet high. The massive rotating blades that pulled the ice and snow into that giant maw were rotating fast enough to create a blur. The secondary impeller blades must have been operating at an even greater speed judging from the energy with which the expelled material, converted to a powder, was rising from the disposal chute.