Smith opened the closet door and was amazed to find no clothing on hangers and little else on the shelf or the floor of the closet. The closet was the cleanest room in the apartment. A single red velvet cord hung from the clothes rod, terminating in a hangman’s noose. Smith was curious about this odd assemblage.
“Hey, Tom,” said Smith to Tom Bateson, one of Smith’s assistants in CSAC security. “What do you make of this?”
Bateson was a relatively young CSAC security agent, working for Smith. A graduate of Yale University, Bateson had started his career as an analyst for the Central Intelligence Agency. Six feet tall and muscular in build, the dark-haired, handsome bachelor was a popular member of the CSAC staff, especially with the young ladies.
He preferred Giorgio Armani suits and wild floral pattern neckties. Bateson was also an aspiring novelist, having written for some literary magazines. His dark hair was always on the long side, which was a continuing source of consternation to the much more conservative Smith.
Bateson came over and took one quick glance at the rope and the noose. “Seems like your boy is into autoerotic asphyxia.”
“Autoerotic what?”
“Autoerotic asphyxia. It’s a peculiar sexually deviant practice where the practitioner ties a noose around his neck, bends his knees to restrict the intake of air, and, huh, you know.” He made a familiar gesture with his cupped hand. “Allegedly, the suffocation brought on by the noose heightens the erotic sensation on climax.”
“What happens if the guy slips and falls or something like that?”
“That’s one of the hazards. If that happens, he dies.”
“Wait a minute — how come you know so much about this?”
“Oh, I read a lot,” said Bateson, rubbing his neck nervously. “Ah, by the way, Chief. Here’s something you might find interesting.”
“It’s just a telephone bill,” said Smith, taking the slip of paper held out by Bateson.
“But look at the numbers on the bill.”
“You’re right; it’s full of those pay-per-call 900 numbers.”
“Not just 900 numbers, but one 900 number: 588-5463.”
“Grayson must have called this number two or three times a night.”
“Not just that, but for twenty to thirty minutes each time, at a dollar fifty per minute, that’s thirty to forty dollars a pop.”
“What does this number do?” said Smith rhetorically.
“It’s called Luv Lines, a singles call in number,” Bateson said.
“How do you know that?” said Smith. “Don’t tell me, I don’t want to know. Remind me to get your telephone bugged, Tom.”
Bateson winced.
Taking one last tour of the vacated apartment, Smith was impressed with the fact that so few personal things that one finds in someone’s home were evident in this apartment. No pictures of relatives or friends, no letters, no bills other than the telephone bill, nothing.
Smith had developed a private theory that Grayson had a contact in CSAC. After all, how could he have tapped into the most sensitive programs of the agency? But the question was who? All CSAC personnel underwent rigorous clearance procedures prior to being asked to join and were subjected to constant loyalty checks. However, there were no clues anywhere in Grayson’s apartment to suggest how he had gained access to the top secret CSAC codes, enabling him to break into the computer files. The raid had resulted in a dead end. In a way, Smith was secretly glad that no CSAC staffers were implicated in this most heinous of crimes.
“What a poor, sick lonesome bastard,” he said to no one in particular.
1993: Closing In
“Wait a minute, Herb,” said Mike Liu as they walked down the corridor of CSAC headquarters in Newport News.
Admiral Robert McHugh had asked that Mike and Herb fly down to Newport News to personally brief him on the unfolding events in Washington.
What had struck Mike’s attention was a casual look at the office directory inside the secured area. The listing, under the Linguistic Laboratory was: Corrine Ryan, Deputy Director.
“Herb, you go ahead. Tell the Old Man I will be there in a few minutes. There is something I have to check out.”
“Okay, Mike,” said Herb Adams as he continued down the corridor.
Within minutes, Mike stood outside the door marked, “Deputy Director — CSAC Linguistics Laboratory.”
Mike gently opened the door.
Inside, the office was dark, only the light of the early morning, filtered by drawn shades shone into the office. In the corner of the office, a woman worked at a computer terminal, the bluish color of the screen bathed the office in an eerie glow. The tinny mechanical squawks of an electronic voice synthesizer spoke out the words and punctuation marks of the text that the woman was quickly typing into her computer.
She was completely absorbed in her work and had not heard Mike enter. The familiar, but faint, scent of Estee` Lauder perfume wafted toward Mike provoking many beautiful and tender memories.
The woman’s honey blond hair hung well below her shoulders. She was dressed in a white silk blouse. Her desk obscured the rest of her attire.
At the corner of her credenza, a slender white cane rested.
Mike’s heart rose in his throat. “God,” he thought. “How many years has it been?”
Suddenly, the woman stopped typing. She turned toward the quiet visitor. Her beautiful emerald green eyes also turned to the noise of the visitor, but they could not see.
“Mike, is that you?”
“Hello, Corrine.” He could not move.
“I could always sense your presence,” said Corrine Ryan quietly in her soft, Virginian drawl.
The years had not changed the beautiful face of Corrine Ryan. Her large eyes still glowed with an emerald fire, even as they could not see. Her complexion was as clear and smooth as the day that Mike first saw her at age nineteen, so many years ago. She had maintained her slim, athletic build and her soft, quiet presence.
“Corrine, I was surprised to see your name in the office directory. I had to see you. I hope you understand.” pled a subdued Mike Liu.
Memories flooded Mike’s thoughts of the beautiful young, junior student with honey blond hair and brilliant emerald green eyes; eyes that could not see, victims of a degenerative nerve disease early in her life. The emerald eyes could not have been more aptly put in anyone than this child of Irish heritage. Corrine was from Annapolis, Maryland, where her father was stationed in the Coast Guard at the time.
The long hours spent reading to one another; she from Braille texts. They had spent many tender hours listening to Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, Tchaikovsky’s “Pathetique”, Simon & Garfunkel, and Johnny Mathis. The long walks around the Lawn and Grounds of the University when Corrine visited Mike.
Despite their race and cultural differences, companionship turned to love and love to commitment. Then Mike graduated, was commissioned an Ensign, and was sent to Stanford for graduate study. Corrine had a fellowship to study linguistics at Columbia University. In the beginning, the letters often passed one another as they flew across the air, but then the separation had its consequences. It was hard to maintain a romance across the continent.
Then, the day came that changed Mike Liu forever. The letter began with an apology for not writing and closed with the news that theirs was not to be.
Corrine stayed on the East Coast and eventually married. Mike later found out that she had divorced, but time and tears had closed that door forever, or so it seemed.