Assumed Identity

11

“What’s he doing now?” the man who called himself Alan asked as he entered the apartment directly above Buchanan’s.

“Nothing,” the muscular man, Major Putnam, said. He sipped from a Styrofoam cup of coffee and watched the television monitors. Again he wore civilian clothes.

“Well, he must be doing something.” Alan glanced around the apartment. The colonel and Captain Weller weren’t around.

“Nope,” Major Putnam said. “Nothing. When he came in, I figured he’d pour himself a drink, go to the bathroom, read a magazine, watch television, do exercises, whatever. But all he did was go over to the sofa. There he is. That’s what he’s been doing since you left him. Nothing.”

Alan approached the row of television monitors. Massaging his right elbow where the nerve that Buchanan had pinched still troubled him, he frowned at a black-and-white image of Buchanan sitting on the sofa. “Jesus.”

Buchanan sat bolt straight, motionless, his expression rigid, his intense gaze focused on a chair across from him.

“Jesus,” Alan repeated. “He’s catatonic. Does the colonel know about this?”

“I phoned him.”

“And?”

“I’m supposed to keep watching. What did the two of you talk about? When he came in, he looked. .”

“It’s what we didn’t talk about.”

“I don’t understand.”

“His brother.”

“Christ,” the major said, “you know that’s an off-limits subject.”

“I wanted to test him.”

“Well, you certainly got a reaction.”

“Yeah, but it’s not the one I wanted.”