Stimson’s face paled. His hands circled the bed railing and grasped it tightly. “The People’s Voice of Revolution, a subversive group the Gap’s been watching for some time.”
“A subversive black group?”
“Yes. Still making something of that?”
“It’s already made, Andy. Think for a minute. Two blacks hit Easton, that Santa Claus with the acidic coffee was black, and Sebastian said the only reason he let me up was because I was white. The PVR is the clincher. Seems we’ve got a pattern here. Sebastian also said he was leaving the country because things were going to start changing very fast and he didn’t want to be around for it. That fit the PVR pattern?”
“Not up till now. Their methods have always been nonviolent, or at least nonconfrontational. But the potential’s there for sure.”
“Membership?”
“Big and getting bigger. The People’s Voice of Revolution is blessed with true charismatic leadership in the person of a fanatic named Mohammed Sahhan. Remember him from that election a few years back?”
“Vaguely. I was overseas at the time. French papers weren’t always loaded with news from the home front.”
“Anyway, Sahhan rose to prominence by openly insisting that a national conspiracy was committed to keeping blacks the doormat of American society. Ninety-nine percent of the population, blacks included, figured he was crazy and just tuned him out. But, as they say, there’s always that one percent. Sahhan developed quite a fanatical following, dedicated to rebuilding society from the ground up.”
“Doesn’t sound very nonviolent to me,” Blaine noted. “The connection’s there, Andy. The PVR got what they needed from Sebastian and then paid a visit to Madame Rosa’s at the right time to ice Easton because he was on to their true nature. Everything fits. All we need now is for that microfiche to confirm it.”
Stimson sighed. “For the time being, the confirmation will have to come from somewhere else. We’ve pulled everything we can off the fiche, and besides lots of blank spaces, this is what we’ve got.” Stimson groped in his jacket pocket and came out with a piece of paper. “See what you make of it.”
He handed it over to Blaine, who inspected it eagerly:
CHRISTMAS EVE DINNER FOR 15,000
Listed below that heading was a dozen or so foods-tomatoes, turkeys, bread loaves — all with numbers preceding them.
“It looks like a shopping list,” McCracken offered. “Maybe Sahhan’s planning a big bash on Christmas Eve.”
Stimson was not amused. “Our top cryptographers are running it through the computers over and over again. We figure it’s got to be a number/letter sequence combination, but we may have lost too much of the fiche to find the proper keys. There’s a message in here somewhere, but we don’t know how to put it together.”
“Easton use anything like it before?”
“Not that we’ve been able to find.”
“Maybe I shouldn’t have killed that Santa Claus,” McCracken muttered. “After all, he’s the expert on Christmas Eve. Maybe the PVR’s got a plot afoot to murder elves or kidnap Rudolph.”
“If they do, only one man can tell us why,” said Stimson.
“Mohammed Sahhan,” said Blaine, while outside on the street below, a PA mounted atop an ancient Chevy repeated its taped message over and over: “Get your shopping done! Only seven days left until Christmas!”
Chapter 10
“Ladies and gentlemen, in preparation for our landing in Billings, the captain has turned on the no-smoking sign. …
For Sandy Lister, following the trail of the elusive Randall Krayman began late Friday morning with a journey to Billings, Montana, to interview Alex “Spud” Hollins. Hollins had lived on top of the business world for a brief period after his company developed a new ultra-density microchip that effectively antiquated all similar products of the competition. The chip made life far easier in electronic switching stations used in telecommunications. Sandy did not pretend to understand the specifics of what she was dealing with here. What interested her more was the fact that it was Hollins’s company that Krayman had first bankrupted and then bought out when the invention of the famed Krayman Chip by COM-U-TECH rendered the Hollins version obsolete. Hollins hadn’t gone down without a fight, though. His battles with Randall Krayman made front-page news in The Wall Street Journal for weeks on end, battles he was destined to lose since the Krayman Chip would be manufactured at a cost one-third that of his own.
Still, there was no reason to shed tears over the fate of Spud Hollins. Already a rich man, Krayman’s buy-out of his company had made him a multimillionaire and allowed him to pursue his true dream of raising horses on a vast Montana ranch. He had achieved that dream now, and it surprised Sandy somewhat that after so many years out of the public eye he would consent to an interview on a subject as touchy as Randall Krayman. Perhaps, she thought, it was because Krayman could do no more to hurt him than he had already. Perhaps, too, Hollins was motivated by a desire for revenge, in which case Sandy would have to sift through his words carefully.
She hoped that Hollins might be able to shed light on Krayman Industries as well as on Krayman the man. She came to Billings more excited about a story than she had been in years. The incidents in New York had her wondering what really went on within the Krayman Tower. Surely she should have gone to Shay with the new developments, but she had stubbornly resisted because he would have taken the story away from her. Randall Krayman was hers, which meant Krayman Industries was too. She had never tired of personality journalism, but here was a story that called upon her mind as well as her smile. The change was refreshing, the challenge welcome. She felt like she was reliving the early years of her career, when she had to scratch and claw for every interview. The rewards had been fewer but the satisfaction greater.
Sandy descended the jet’s steps into the frigid air of Billings, and her flesh seemed to freeze on contact. She had forgotten to put on gloves, and her fingers were already numb when she raised them to shield her face. She had known eastern winters for all thirty-three of her years, but nothing she had ever felt prepared her for such sub-zero cold. She stuffed her hands into her overcoat pockets and tucked her carry-on bag under one arm. Besides that there was only one other suitcase she had to retrieve inside the terminal.
At the baggage claim area several passengers asked her for autographs but most kept to themselves. Finally seeing her suitcase rolling toward her on the conveyor belt gave her an excuse to beg off. She was reaching for it as it passed, when a large hand cut in front of hers and grasped the handle.
“I’ll take that for ya, Miss Lister,” a voice drawled.
“Excuse me?”
“Mr. Hollins sent me out here to fetch ya, ma’am. Didn’t mean to startle ya none.”
“You didn’t. It’s just that I wasn’t expecting anyone to pick me up.”
The man, who was big and broad, in his fifties, with a wind-carved face, yanked off his cowboy hat. “Yeah, well, a storm blew in last night and dumped more ’an a foot on the roads. Plows don’t always make it up to our spread and Mr. Hollins didn’t want you drivin’ some rented Ford into a gully.” He smoothed his hair, replaced his cowboy hat, and led her toward the airport lobby, suitcase in hand. “Mr. Hollins also told me to issue ya an invitation to stay over at the ranch if you’d like.”
“I have a reservation at the—”
“Nothin’ beats good ol’ Hollins hospitality, ma’am.” They were almost to the exit doors. “Come on, ma’am, got your limo parked right this way. Name’s Buck, by the by.”