'Thanks.'
He was struggling with something, wondering whether he really wanted to say it. 'You're trying to justify yourself, I guess.'
'Bull…' she groaned.
'No, it's true.'
She glowered at him. The man could be so infuriating. 'Why do I need to justify anything?'
'That cottage. It was where he killed himself, wasn't it?'
She didn't bother to reply.
'No problem,' Barnside said. 'I understand. And that drove you here, drove you into the Agency, kept you fighting to keep your head up all the way. As if that proved something.'
'I don't,' she spat, 'have to prove a damn thing.'
'No?'
He wasn't smiling any more. He was downright uncomfortable. 'You know what I'd think in your position, Helen? I'd think I'd get in there, I'd show these people who destroyed him, who ruined this innocent man. Except I wouldn't have the guts now, not me. Believe that.'
She watched them racing through the pages coming out of the printer, and she couldn't think of a thing to say.
'And something else too, Helen. Once you get there, once you know the kind of world we live in, suddenly everything doesn't look so black and white any more, does it?'
She tried to stop listening. She wished she could move away. 'Meaning?'
'Meaning that once you know what life's like in this place, you get to wondering whether everything is as nice and simple as that. Whether any of us is as innocent as we seem. And maybe whether your old man really was innocent.'
She wished she hadn't given up smoking. She wished she had a drink. 'You talk too much.'
He shook his head and put a big hand, like a bear's paw, gently on her shoulder. 'If it's worth anything, I read the files. Years ago. I know what your family was doing in Maine. That was where you ran? When they were closing in on him. In Boston. You just upped roots and got out of town for a while, thinking this would all blow over.'
'That's irrelevant,' she said, catching her breath in the stifling, overcrowded room.
'No. It is absolutely relevant. This is where he ran. And this is where he killed himself when he knew the game was up. Is it right you were the one who found him? That must be hard to live with.'
Speaking very slowly, she said, 'Will you get off my fucking back — '
'No. I won't. Because you're letting something personal get in the way of the job. And you're too smart, too damn good for that.'
'You're an a — a - asshole, Dave,' she said.
'An a — a - asshole?' he said, eyes twinkling. 'Hey, I never knew you had a stutter lurking beneath the surface there, Helen. Listen. I read the files. All the files. Not just the ones that went to the Senate committee and got them off the hook. Your old man was clean. As clean as any of us. You got to believe that and let this thing go before it eats you right up.'
She could see the little cottage in her mind's eye. If she tried, she guessed she could smell the salt air coming through the window, mingling with the cold, harsh aroma of spilled blood.
'I didn't enjoy saying that,' Barnside added. 'But it needed saying.'
She looked at Barnside and knew that, in his own odd way, he was trying to help. 'Well, now you've said it. So can we get on with the job?'
CHAPTER 46
Calling the Postman
As the Nevada night fell and Bill Ruffin worked with Mary Gallagher to erect a flimsy, opaque clover leaf in space above the sun-drenched Pacific, FBI agent Bernard Mason phoned the US Postal Service sorting office in Alamo, north of Vegas, out on the long drab line of 93 running through the desert. He got a mouthful of abuse for his pains.
Mason held the phone away from his ear, waited for the cursing to subside, then said, 'Sir, I know it's the busy time for you.'
And wondered to himself: How many busy times do you get in a one-horse town like this? On a day when the world, by official order, has put a closed sign on its door and the entire phone system has been down until only an hour ago?
'Then call back later,' said the old, sour voice on the end.
'Sir,' Mason continued, 'this is the FBI. And this is important. What's more, you don't have a delivery tomorrow, what with the emergency and everything.'
'You're so clever, smart-ass, how come you even knew I was here?'
'I phoned your home. Your wife told me.'
There was a pause on the line. 'She told you that?'
'Yeah.'
'Bitch. I told her I was going drinking. How'd she know I just came in to catch up on some paperwork?'
362
'I guess some of us are just wedded to the job. They notice, you know. Mine does.'
'Yeah,' the voice said, a touch of empathy there. 'Well. What do you want?' And listened.
'New York State,' the man said at the end.
'Excuse me?'
'Yasgur's Farm. Woodstock, New York State. Don't you people know history?'
'Yeah,' Mason said. 'We know that one. But this is someplace named after it. In Nevada. Maybe.'
'Maybe?'
'I'm just asking. I thought you guys just liked to get stuff through, even if it had the wrong address, no zip code, that kind of thing… just like the Mounties, always get your man.'
'Hey, you want to hear about no zip code? We get stuff here with no goddamn name on it sometimes, and they still expect it in their mailbox the next morning.'
'Precisely, sir. So I was wondering. If something came your way with "Yasgur's Farm" on the front of the envelope, would you people know what to do with it?'
'Don't ask me. I'm just the manager. But if you wait a moment I'll ask a man who might know.'
The line went dead. Mason shuffled through the sheaf of numbers in front of him. Nevada was a big place. It seemed to have an awful lot of post offices. Ash Springs was next.
'You still there, Mr FBI?'
'Oh yes, sir.'
'I spoke to Ronnie Wilson who, surprise, surprise, is taking the opportunity of this unexpected holiday to prop up the bar at Joe's. He's our field operative.' The man chuckled. 'You get that?'
'I am trying to contain my merriment, sir. And?'
'He says there's someplace out at Cabin Springs, the old dry lake, out on the back road through the wildlife refuge. Couple of times recently he's had to make some special deliveries out there. Says they had zip codes, a PO box number, and "Yasgur's Farm" on the label. You believe that? These people. Either they give you too little information or it's too much.'
Bernard Mason blinked, felt his heart make a little jump, and reached for the pen. 'He's sure about that.'
'Oh no. He's just making the whole damn thing up. You people have lives to go to or what?'
'Okay,' Mason said, 'give me the details.'
Thirty seconds later he pushed a piece of paper in front of Fogerty and said, 'We got a hit. Remote farmhouse out on a back road that runs out from 95 all the way through the wildlife refuge straight into 93 just short of Alamo. Close to the 93 end.'
'Map,' Fogerty said, and watched Larry Wolfit mangle the keyboard. The zip code pulled up an area map from the Postal Service. This provided an overlay for the digital security image.
'Jesus Christ,' someone said behind Fogerty. An officer in Air Force uniform was following the screen.
'You know this?' Fogerty asked.
'That's on the edge of the Nellis restricted area. We let people through because of the refuge and there's a couple of homes, mainly for weekenders. We're taking practice bombing runs up to ten miles short of Cabin Springs. They're right under our nose. This is going to be easy.'
'Really,' Fogerty said quietly, and went back to the screen. 'Have you found this place yet?'
Wolfit had the refuge up on the map. There was precious little detail at this altitude, just the thin line of the desert track and an outline, like an ink spot, of the lake itself.