The Devil's Bed

  They’d transported him to the nearest medical facility, the St. Croix Regional Medical Center. They’d done a CAT scan to make sure there was no internal damage from his fall. They’d x-rayed his knee, had found bone chips, and had immobilized the joint pending surgery. They’d cleaned and dressed the wound on his head. Then they’d isolated him in the Psychiatric Unit. No one had come to see him since he’d been taken into custody and had told his story. He hadn’t been read his rights, nor had they given him an opportunity to make a phone call. He was not under arrest, they said. Since they’d locked him in the room hours before, he hadn’t seen a living soul.

  He didn’t mind the isolation. It gave him time to think. And what he thought about was David Solomon Moses.

  Moses had done terrible things. Killed many times over. Murdered agents Bo knew and respected. That he’d lived, according to Dr. Jordan Hart, in a world that he perceived to be in a constant state of war, much of it directed against him, didn’t alter greatly Bo’s impression of the man. He’d hunted Moses as he would an animal, a sick, dangerous animal. He’d thought of him as hate stuffed into a thin sheath of flesh. Yet on the cliff, with Kate on her knees, Moses had offered her a chance at life. Why? And later he’d killed the men whose assignment it was to assassinate her. Had that been for his own dark reasons? Or had Bo, in that St. Paul church, actually convinced him to let go of vengeance? Father Don Cannon claimed people came into the world with much of their spirit already formed. If that was true, then maybe something had been in David Moses when he was born, some possibility of goodness that all the cruelty and betrayal in his life hadn’t managed to destroy completely. Bo would never know for sure. Moses had taken all the answers with him.

  Like the ceiling light, the windows in the room were covered with heavy wire mesh. Above the door a security camera was mounted to the wall. Bo guessed he was being watched. By whom was a concern, for he knew all too well that NOMan was everywhere. They could shoot him in that room and make it look like anything they wanted to. He had refused the pain medication the medical staff offered. If he was going to die, he wanted to be awake for the event.

  They came for him after many hours. There were three of them, men in dark blue suits, accompanied by an attendant in a white uniform. It was the attendant who unlocked the door, and who brought a wheelchair.

  “Let’s go, Thorsen,” one of the suits said.

  “Where?” Bo asked.

  “Shut up,” another suit said.

  Bo didn’t want to give them any reason to kill him if that’s what they were looking for. He went without protest.

  They didn’t go far. He was wheeled into an adjacent room, this one with a table and three chairs and no window. Most of one wall was reflecting glass, a two-way mirror. Two of the chairs were already occupied by other men in suits. One suit was light gray, the other a charcoal pinstripe. Bo was positioned across the table from the two men. The gray suit nodded to the blue suits, who left the room.

  “Do you know who I am?” the gray suit asked.

  “No.”

  “I’m Assistant Director James Norton, Secret Service.”

  Bo knew the name, although not the man.

  Norton nodded toward the pinstripe. “This is FBI Assistant Director Hector Lopez.”

  Lopez said, “We’ve been looking into the story you told. Your allegations concerning National Operations Management are, quite frankly, pretty crazy. We’ve done some preliminary investigating, and we can find nothing to indicate that NOMan is anything other than what it purports to be.”

  Norton said, “You contend that NOMan wanted the First Lady assassinated, and you’ve alleged that Senator William Dixon is involved. Yet you have no evidence of this. Nor can you give us any reason why any of these people would instigate such an action.”

  “I’ve been thinking about that,” Bo said. “My guess is that it has something to do with the president’s reelection. Newly widowed, Dixon would be hard to beat. And NOMan could lay the blame on Moses.”

  “I’ve got to tell you, Agent Thorsen,” Lopez said, “this conspiracy theory of yours sounds like paranoid raving. The raving of a man already wanted in connection with a murder in St. Paul. As a matter of fact, we believe there is sufficient evidence at this point to seek an indictment against you, should we choose to advise the federal attorney to do so.”

  “An indictment would never hold up in court,” Bo said.

  “Wouldn’t it?”

  “Is this a threat?”

  “It’s a potential, Agent Thorsen,” Norton said.

  “Funny, it sounds just like a threat.”

  Norton put on a pair of half glasses and lifted a cordovan attaché case from the floor beside his chair. He snapped it open and pulled out several pages of typed documents that he slid across the table to Bo.

  “This is your statement of the events leading up to the death of David Moses.” Norton cast a look at Bo over the flat rim of his half glasses. “The most recent death.”

  Bo scanned the document. “This isn’t my story. This makes no mention of NOMan. It says Moses acted alone.”

  “This is the statement we want you to sign.”

  “This is bullshit.”

  “Agent Thorsen,” Norton said, “consider the impact of your accusations. If the American people believe your story, imagine the erosion of public confidence, the chaos.”

  Lopez said, “The Bureau is already at work very quietly assessing the true threat of NOMan. If this organization is anything that you contend it is, don’t you think we want to combat it as much as you? I’m an assistant director of a federal agency, but I’m an American citizen first and foremost. I love this country. I have every intention of preserving its laws and the integrity of the system that governs it.”

  “If there is any truth at all in what you say, we have to consider how to address this situation,” Norton said. “At the moment, we feel that silence on your part is the best way.”

  “And if I don’t agree?”

  Lopez said, “Charges will be brought against you, and the federal government will do its best to prove, in the case of the People v. Bo Thorsen, that you did willfully murder Special Agent-in-Charge Diana Ishimaru.”

  “No jury would convict.”

  “Do you want to take that chance? And in the meantime, drag your name through the dirt?”

  “And alert NOMan and contribute in no small way to that organization’s ability to cover its tracks.”

  Bo stared at the pages on the table. “It says here that I believe David Moses killed Diana. That’s not true.”

  “It may have to be true. For now.”

  “There’s a greater good that needs to be considered, Thorsen.”

  Bo read the final page of the documents. “This is a letter of resignation.”

  Norton said, “We feel it’s best if you step out of the picture entirely.”

  Bo studied the men. Things began to blur, not just his thinking but his vision. He felt a little faint. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had a decent night’s sleep. Or a good meal. Or felt as if the weight of an enormous responsibility didn’t rest on his shoulders alone. He glanced at the mirror, wondering who would be there if he stepped through the looking glass. There seemed nothing real to hold to anymore. No one to trust. Were these men connected to NOMan? Or were they really trying to control the damage that might be wrought if the public knew that such an organization had so effectively infiltrated the entire federal government?

  He looked down at the pen that Norton held out to him, and he took it. He poised to sign. Before he did, he leveled his eyes once more on the faces of the men across the table.

  “You both were field agents once?” he asked.

  His question seemed to puzzle them.

  “We were,” Norton said.

  “If you were in my place, if you’d seen Diana Ishimaru, a good agent and a good friend, murdered, would you sign this document?”

  A moment passed,
then Norton said, “Yes.”

  But what he said didn’t matter. Because between the question and the answer, Bo had seen the truth in the eyes of both men.

  Bo put down the pen. “Gentlemen, we remain at odds.”

  “You’re making a mistake, Agent Thorsen,” Norton said, but it sounded more like words than belief.

  “If so, it’s a mistake of my own choosing. And I’ll take my chances.”

  • • •

  They finally fed him. He’d grown accustomed to the pain, to the constant throb deep in his knee. He was tired, but he fought sleep. Whenever he started to drift off, he jerked his leg to the side and gave himself an eye-opening jolt of agony. Even so, his thinking was beginning to get as fuzzy as the wire mesh over the light fixture.

  He had no idea how long he’d been isolated like this when the door of his room opened and Lorna Channing stepped in, alone.

  “You should have called me,” she said.

  “When I needed you, I didn’t have the number,” Bo replied.

  “For want of a nail, the shoe was lost.”

  “We won the battle,” Bo pointed out.

  “And we’re going to win the war, Agent Thorsen.”

  Channing walked to the window and touched the heavy mesh with her hand. It was day outside, late afternoon Bo judged from the position of the sun in the sky. Channing’s shadow fell across the floor behind her, stretching all the way to where Bo lay.

  “Before she was killed, Diana Ishimaru made a telephone call,” Channing said. “She called the hotel room of Secret Service Assistant Director Bill Malone who, I’m sure you’re aware, was in the Twin Cities ostensibly to oversee the investigation into your actions at Wildwood. Malone immediately placed a call to a cell phone number. The number’s been traced to one of the men shot dead last night, one of the men you claim was preparing to assassinate the First Lady. I’m guessing it wouldn’t surprise you to learn that years ago Assistant Director Malone was the Secret Service liaison to NOMan. Although he’s unaware of it at the moment, we now have him under constant surveillance.” Channing turned back to Bo.

  “I’ve just come from Wildwood. I had a long visit with the First Lady and her father. I gave them a copy of your statement. Your statement, not that crap Norton and Lopez tried to ram down your throat. We’ve spoken with Tom Jorgenson and he’s told us quite a lot. Pretty incredible things. According to him, NOMan was established to help mitigate the influence of incompetent leadership and to nudge the world away from aggression. Kate told him she didn’t consider her assassination a milestone on the road to peace.”

  Channing allowed herself a brief smile.

  “Information is power,” she continued. “Any organization with power and that operates under a cloak of secrecy and darkness becomes a breeding ground for monstrous abuse, no matter how good-intentioned the goals are initially. In the isolated beauty of his orchards, away from the microphones and the cameras, Tom Jorgenson accomplished miracles. William Dixon used NOMan in a different, brutal way. I think we’ll find as we dig deeper that NOMan has been used to advance all kinds of agendas, personal and political.

  “The roots run deep, Agent Thorsen. The tendrils are widespread. We have a long, hard struggle ahead of us, but thanks to you, I’m confident we’ll be able to deliver a good old-fashioned butt-kicking.” She crossed the room and stood beside Bo’s bed. “The president sends his greetings, and has asked me personally to express to you his profound gratitude.” She offered Bo her hand. “As for me, I’m just glad you’re on our side.”

  chapter

  forty-eight

  Lorna Channing opened the door to the Oval Office. “He’ll see you now, Senator.”

  William Dixon came in, grinning as if he’d just arrived at a barbecue in his honor. “Well, well,” he said, seeing the president and the First Lady standing together. “Now there’s a lovely family portrait. Good to have you back, Katie. Brought Stephanie home, I hope. I’ve missed that little girl.”

  “Sit down,” the president said.

  “Thank you, I believe I will. The leg’s been acting up a bit lately. Keeps me awake at night sometimes.” The senator eased himself onto the couch and settled his cane beside him. “Know what I do at night when I can’t sleep, Clayboy? I lie there remembering. Couldn’t tell you what I had for dinner last night, but I can tell you the color of your mother’s dress the first time we met. Blue, just like a Colorado sky.” He stared at the rug a moment, as if he were seeing woven among the threads an image from nearly sixty years before. Then he lifted his dark eyes toward his son. “I remember a lot of strange old things at night. I remember the first man I ever saw die. A kid named Jorge Rodriguez. From Spanish Harlem. A Jap sniper put a bullet right there.” He touched a spot below his left eye. “That was on my first day in the Philippines. I saw a lot more kids die after that. Too many to remember them all.”

  “That’s war, Senator,” the president said.

  “Know what I would like, Clay? I would like it if you called me Dad.”

  “This isn’t—” the president began.

  “I know what this isn’t.”

  William Dixon looked steadily at his son, then at his daughter-in-law. Behind him, in that long moment of silence that fell over the room, Channing very quietly opened the door to the Oval Office.

  “I’d like to tell you a story,” the First Lady said.

  “I’m all ears, Katie.” William Dixon looked up at her with an indulgent smile.

  “In Minnesota, the Ojibwe used to tell of a monster that sometimes came out of the woods to prey on villages. It was called the Windigo, a terrible beast with a heart of ice who fed on the flesh of the Ojibwe people. Because it was so large and so fierce, it terrified even the bravest warrior. There was only one way you could fight the Windigo. You had to become a Windigo yourself, submit to whatever dark magic was necessary to turn you into an ogre, too. But there was an awful risk. You had to be sure that someone who loved you was waiting with hot tallow for you to drink after you killed the monster. The hot tallow would melt your icy heart and bring you back down to the size of other people. If there was no one to help you in that way, you ended up staying a Windigo. You became forever the thing you set out to destroy.”

  “Interesting story, Katie, but I’m afraid the point missed me.”

  “I want you to know I forgive you, Bill. It’s my way of offering hot tallow.”

  He stared up at her with an uncomprehending look. “That’s wonderful, really. But I still don’t understand.”

  “NOMan,” Clay Dixon said.

  The senator’s eyes swung toward his son, and for an instant, his face seemed to soften. “That’s a pretty chilly tone. You sound like a man whose heart is ice.”

  The president said, “I’ve ordered a suspension of all functions performed by National Operations Management, and mandatory administrative leave for NOMan personnel.”

  “That’s quite a layoff. It could alienate a lot of voters.”

  “Even as we speak, evidence is being gathered by federal law enforcement agencies. I anticipate a number of indictments against key government officials, both inside and outside NOMan.”

  “Evidence of what? Indictments on what charges?”

  “We both know what I’m talking about. National Operations Management, or NOMan as you seem to prefer it be called, operates from a much different agenda than its mandate calls for. From what we’re uncovering, it’s evident that NOMan has worked for decades in a covert manner to influence events of national scope and importance. Let me be clear. By covert, I’m speaking of nothing less than murder.

  “Most recently, NOMan was responsible for the murder of Robert Lee, for the murder of a Secret Service agent named Diana Ishimaru, and for a plot to assassinate the First Lady and her father. I’ve asked for further investigation into the death of Alan Carpathian, whom, I’m now convinced, you had killed in the hope of opening the door of the White House to NOMan.

  “These
actions, and others that are coming to light, go far beyond murder. They’re clearly treasonous in their effect of subverting the authority of the federal government. They strike at the heart of the legal and constitutional processes that underlie this nation.”

  The senator clapped his hands. “That’s quite a speech. Where are the cameras?” He shook his head. “You know, Clayboy, to the average American voter you’ll sound like a lunatic. If I were you, I wouldn’t rely too heavily on the things Tom Jorgenson has said. After what that poor man’s been through, that awful head injury and then his stroke, I’m betting it won’t be hard to convince the American people that he’s just a little confused. You go public with your accusations and you’ll throw the election away.”

  “My first responsibility is to this nation, Senator, to do my best to see that it’s secure from enemies outside our borders and within.”

  “Enemies?” A deep, angry flush colored the senator’s usual white pallor, and his knuckles humped tight over the head of his cane. “I remember the first time I laid eyes on you. You weren’t much bigger than my hand. I promised myself that my son would never go through the kind of hell I’d gone through. I promised myself that if I had anything to do with it, no man’s son ever would.

  “I’m going to speculate here for just a minute. If NOMan actually functioned in the way you seem to believe, it could be that this country never had a better friend. Do you have any idea of the number of international blunders, partisan follies, and just plain crazy decisions made by the men in this office that have resulted in tragedies of catastrophic proportions?” He pointed a finger at his son. “You presidents. You come here with a dream, at best. At worst, you’ve got a laundry list of ill-conceived notions. You’re here for a few years, and then you’re a footnote in history. In war, it would be like letting green recruits play general. You have no idea of the havoc you wreak.

  “But maybe there are those who do, men and women who know firsthand the pain caused by the bunglings and betrayals of this office and others. And if they’ve committed their lives and their fortunes to doing their best to help this country avoid disaster whenever possible, then I’d certainly be tempted to applaud them.