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HOUR 11

Another conference room, another group. This room was decorated entirely in Tahiti posters; it occurred to Graves that whoever had owned the travel agency before it went bankrupt was a Tahiti-nut. Perhaps he was himself Tahitian. Graves began to wonder why the Tahitian owner had gone out of business. Too much time away from the office, basking in the sun? Discrimination against him by Angelenos? Some rare disease carried by coconuts which had made him an invalid?

`Gentlemen,' Phelps said, and cleared his throat. Graves was snapped back to the present. He looked around the room. There were, he saw, a number of high-ranking Washington people. They all looked tired and disgruntled. Phelps had brought them out to California on a red-eye flight, let them sleep a few hours, then dragged them up for a meeting with… John Graves?

`John Graves,' Phelps said, `has come up from San Diego this morning to brief you on John Wright. Mr Graves has been in charge of Wright's surveillance in New York and San Diego for the past three months.' Phelps nodded to Graves, and Graves stood.

`We have some footage which is quite revealing,' Graves said. `I thought we'd begin with that, if we can screen it…'

The men in the room looked confused. Even Phelps, who never lost his aplomb, seemed uncertain. Graves settled it by tearing down several Tahitian posters from the wall, clearing a blank white space. He was embarrassed for a moment - the tearing noise sounded somehow indiscreet with all these Washington guns, and the whole business emphasized the makeshift nature of the surroundings.

Phelps seemed to sense it, too. `You must excuse us,' he said, `but these are temporary quarters for the duration of the Republican Convention.'

Graves stepped to one side as the room lights dimmed. A black-and-white image was projected on the wall. It showed a dapper, rather handsome man standing at a podium. For a moment there was no sound, and then it came on abruptly. The voice was sharp, vigorous, and slightly petulant.

`- can a person do in the twentieth century? The question is not rhetorical, my friends. Each and every one of us is powerless in the face of giant corporations, giant institutions, giant government. Do you think automobiles are badly made? Do you think your electricity bill is too high? Do you disagree with the nation's foreign policy? Well, there's nothing much you can do about it. No matter what you think, or I think, the wheels continue to spin of their own inertia.'

The film image of John Wright paused to take a drink of water. `Perhaps you think that a few people have power - high government officials, high corporate executives, wealthy individuals. But that also is untrue. Everyone is locked into a system which he has inherited and is powerless to change. We are all trapped, my friends. That is the meaning of the twentieth century. It is the century of impotence.'

Wright's voice dropped lower, became more ominous. Isis face was grim. `Impotence,' he repeated. `Inability to act. Inability to be effective. This is what we must change. And with the help of God, we shall.'

There was some applause on the sound track before the film ran out of the camera and the room lights came back on. Graves lit a cigarette and flipped through the pages of his own file on Wright before speaking.

`I showed you that film for psychological, not politcal, reasons,' he said, `because it summarizes most of what we know about John Wright's mental state. The speech was given last year before the annual conference of the Americans for a Better Nation, an- extremist group which Wright started and still leads. You've probably never heard of it. It's small, and has no significance whatsoever in national politics. Over the last few years, Wright has poured 1.7 million dollars into the organization. The money apparently doesn't matter to him. But the lack of impact - the impotence - matters a great deal.'

He paused and glanced around the faces at the table. They seemed to be paying attention, but just barely. Two were doodling on the pads before them. `John Wright,' he said, `is now forty-nine years old. He is the son of Edmund Wright, of the Wright steel family. He is an only child. His father was a crude, domineering man and an alcoholic. John grew up in his shadow, a very strange child. He was a good student and learned quite a lot of mathematics, even made a minor reputation for himself in that field. On the other hand, he was an inveterate gambler, horse racer, and womanizer.'

The assembled men began to fidget. Graves nodded to the projectionist, who began flashing up slides. The first showed Edmund Wright glaring into the camera. `Edmund Wright died of cirrhosis in 1955. John Wright changed completely when that happened. He moved to New York from Pittsburgh and became a kind of local celebrity. He was married four times to well-known actresses; all the marriages ended in divorce. The last divorce, from Sarah Layne, occurred in 1967 and coincided with a six-month nervous breakdown for Wright. He was hospitalized in McClain General outside Atlanta for paranoid ideation and feelings of impotence. Apparently he had been impotent with his last wife.'

A picture of Sarah Layne flashed up. The men all stirred uncomfortably as they stared at the image: handsome, but haughty and undeniably challenging.

HOUR 11 LOS ANGELES 6 AM PDT 2:

'Wright left the hospital against doctors' advice and plunged into the political organization he formed: Americans for a Better Nation. For the next four years he gave speeches and wrote pamphlets. In 1968 he worked hard to influence the national elections on every level - mostly without success. He fell into a depression after that.

`Recently, his interest in politics dropped sharply. He seems to have withdrawn from any kind of public life; he no longer holds large parties and no longer participates in the social life of New York. According to all information, he has been intensely studying a variety of subjects that are rather ominous. These include sociology, radiation theory, physics, and some aspects of biology. He has interviewed experts in several different areas -' Graves flipped the pages of his file `- including cancer experts, civil engineers, horticulture specialists, and aerosol spray-can designers. He -'

`Aerosol spray-can designers?' someone asked.

`That is correct.'

There was some head scratching among those present.

`He also became interested in the meteorology of the Southwest.'

The men were listening now and looking very puzzled. All the doodling had stopped.

'Wright was listed as a Potential Surveillance Subject at the end of 1968, after he had engaged in some questionable activities to influence the national election. As a PSS he did nothing out of the ordinary until six months ago. Then two things happened.

`First, Wright began to transfer large amounts of money from various accounts in this country and in Switzerland. As you know, we keep an eye on private capital transfers in excess of $300,000. Wright was moving much more than that. Secondly, he began to be seen with known underworld figures. The pattern of behaviour suggested a courtship, and we became very concerned at that point.'

The slides changed again several times in rapid succession, showing smooth-faced businessmen. `Robert ".`Trigger" Cannino. Sal Martucci. Benny Flick. Gerald "Tiny" Margolin. These are some of the men he saw during that period.'

The slides now showed Wright in restaurants, at taxi stands, and in Central Park with these men.

`Active surveillance began in June 1972, when Wright left New York for San Diego. He was clearly making plans for the Republican Convention, but their nature was not clear, and he was giving himself much too much time. I ran the surveillance from the start. During the surveillance period his contacts with organized crime have substantially decreased. He has been seeing only one person consistently - this man.'

The screen showed a bald, glowering face.

'Eddie "The Key" Trasker, fifty-three, a resident of Las Vegas who lives mostly in San Diego. He is reputed to be the power behind the Teamsters, and his influence over all forms of interstate transportation is enormous. Wright has seen him nearly every week, often during the early hours of the morning.

`He has also come in contact with this man, Timothy Drew, an ex-Army officer with a background in computers. The meaning of that association was unclear to me until this morning. Drew clearly represents Sigma Station; Drew tapped out classified Defence information for Wright. We do not know what kind of information, or why it was stolen.'

Graves sat down and looked at the faces. Phelps said, `Questions, gentlemen?'

McPherson, from the President's staff, cleared his throat. `I gather from Mr Graves' excellent but rather psychologically oriented presentation that we have no damned idea what Wright is up to. Is that substantially correct?'

`Yes, it is,' Graves said.

`Well then,' McPherson said, `I'm afraid we can do nothing. Wright has acted suspiciously and is quite probably deranged. Neither is a crime in this country.'

`I disagree,' Corey said, sitting back in his chair. Corey was Defence liaison; a heavyset man with thick eyebrows that joined over his nose. `I think we have plenty of reason to apprehend Wright at this time.'

`Plenty of reason,' McPherson said, `but no evidence, no charges…'

Whitlock, from the justice Department, straightened his tie and said, `I'm sure we all agree this is an unpleasant sort of meeting. Mr Wright is a private citizen and he is entitled to do as he pleases so long as he does not commit a crime. I've seen and heard nothing that suggests a crime has been or will be committed, and '

`What about the underworld contacts?' Corey said.

Whitlock smiled. `What about them?'

`I think that's very suggestive -'

`But he has broken no law,' Whitlock said. `And until he.does…' He shrugged.

Corey frowned, pushing his eyebrows into a black, ominous V. `An interrogation would be useful, even without a criminal act,' he said. `I think we have a basis for interrogation here - Wright's association with Timothy Drew, who has stolen classified information, probably for Wright. Can't we pick him up on that?'

`I feel we should,' Phelps said, speaking for the first time.

Graves spun around to look at Phelps.

`I disagree,' McPherson said.

Whitlock made some notes on the pad in front of him. Finally he said, `Perhaps an interrogation is the safest route. I think we need to know what was tapped out by Sigma Station. Mr Corey?'

`Pick him up.'

`Mr Phelps?'

`Pick him up.'

`Mr McPherson?'

`Opposed.'

Whitlock spread his hands. Graves said nothing. The meeting was over.

`If there are no further questions,' Phelps said, `we can adjourn.'

`You didn't like that, did you?' Phelps said, as they walked back through the travel agency.

`No,' Graves said. `I didn't.'

`Still,' Phelps said, `I think it's best. Arrest him today, on suspicion of conspiracy to commit grand larceny involving classified information.'

`Isn't it robbery?'

Phelps sighed patiently. `Robbery and larceny are different crimes.'

Graves said, `How long can I wait?'

`A few hours. Play with him if you want, but pick him up by evening. I want to get to the bottom of this.'

Graves couldn't make the arrest himself. He'd need federal marshals. `You'll notify the marshals in San Diego?'

`They're waiting for your call,' Phelps said, and smiled. As much as he ever did.

Graves had fifteen minutes before he had to return to the airport. As he walked out of the travel agency, he heard a room filled with mechanical chatter. Curious, he paused and opened the door. He found that one office had been converted into a temporary hardware room. It had once been somebody's office, but now there were six teletypes and computer consoles installed there. He was reminded that the State Department (Intelligence Division) and the NSA had more computers than any other organizations in the world.

The room was empty at this hour. He glanced at the teletypes, noting their colour. When he first started working at State in the early sixties, rooms like this had contained five red teletypes and one blue teletype. The red machines recorded information from over-seas stations and embassies; the blue was for domestic data. Now, four of the machines were blue and only two were red.

There had been a shift in orientation for State Intelligence. Nobody cared any longer about the movements of an eighth assistant deputy minister in the Yugoslav government. They were much more interested in the number five man in the Black Panther Party, or the number three man in the John Birch Society, or the number six man in Americans for a Better Nation.

He sat down at a computer console, stared at the blank TV screen, and began typing in Wright's call numbers. The screen glowed and printed out the categories of stored information:

Graves stared at the categories with some distaste. It was disturbing that the government should have so much information on a private individual - particularly one who had committed no criminal act at any time.

Then on an impulse he pushed the `Wipe' button and the screen went blank. He typed in `Graves, John Norman', followed by his own call-up number. He sat back and watched the numbers print out on the screen:

He hesitated, then punched `Auth: VQ'

After another hesitation, he punched `Phelps, Richard D'.

RECORD CALL-UP NAME AS PHELPS, RICHARD D. FILE CONTENTS CANNOT BE DISPLAYED ON THIS CONSOLE TO THE ABOVENAMED PERSON. CALL-UP PERSON IS ADVISED TO ACQUIRE NTK AUTHORIZATION FROM DEPARTMENT HEAD.

Graves smiled. So even Phelps couldn't call up Graves' file without a special need-to-know authorization. Who could call it up? Feeling whimsical, he typed out `This is the President of the United States.'

The screen glowed:

Graves sighed. Computers just didn't show any respect. He pressed the `Wipe' button and returned to the question of Wright.

He didn't really know what he was looking for. Graves had supplied most of the computerized file contents himself. But perhaps someone else had added to it. He pushed the 008 sequence calling up miscellaneous information. That category had been empty two weeks ago. Now it contained an academic history of Wright's work in mathematics, prepared by `S. Vessen, State/Anal/412'. Whoever that was. He had a moment of pleasure at the thought that State's analysis people were abbreviated `anal'. It was fitting.

He turned to the information itself:

Graves stared at the screen. The notion of twocomponent interactions fascinated him. It seemed to have all sorts of connotations. He punched buttons and looked at the bibliography, which was not revealing. He looked at the abstracts of articles written by Wright. They were equally unrevealing. Then he saw that a final study was available: Apparently S. Vessen had applied a statistical analysis of his own to Wright's work.

Graves frowned, staring at the last word. Then he pressed the `Wipe' button a final time and hurried to catch his plane.

The aircraft banked steeply over the oil fields of Long Beach and headed south towards San Diego. Graves stared out the window, thinking of Wright's file. Then he thought about his own. He wondered what it looked like, the information displayed on the unblinking cathode-ray screen in sharp white easy-to-read block letters. He wondered how accurate it was, how fair, how honest, how kind.

Graves was thirty-six years old. He had worked for the government fifteen years - nearly half his life. That fact implied a dedication which had never been there; from the start his career in government had been a kind of accident.

In college Graves had studied subjects that interested him, whether they were practical or not. On the surface they seemed highly impractical: Russian literature and mathematics. He was drafted immediately after college and did push-ups for five weeks before somebody in the Army discovered what he knew. Then he was sent to the language school in Monterey, where he remained forty-eight hours - just long enough to be tested - before being flown to Washington.

That was in 1957, and the Cold War was grim. Washington needed Russian translators desperately. There were fears of a land war in Europe, fears of grand conquistadorial campaigns conducted by World Communism, meaning those two friendly allies, Russia and China. At the time the fears had seemed compelling and logical.

Graves worked for two years in the Army as a Slavic translator, and after his discharge joined the State Department in the same capacity. The pay was good and the work was interesting; he had the feeling of being useful, of doing necessary and even important work. In 1959 he married a girl on Senator Westlake's staff. They had a daughter in 1961. They got divorced two years later. He had a kidney stone and spent five days in the hospital. He met a nice girl, almost married her, but didn't. He bought a new car. He moved to a new apartment.

In retrospect, these seemed to be the signposts, the significant shifts and alterations in his life. The years went by: he wore his hair a little longer, but the hair was thinner, exposing more of his temples. His trousers got tight, then flared, and now were baggy again, as they had been in the fifties. There were cyclic changes in himself and his world - but he was still working for the government.

State no longer wanted Russian translators. The big push was for Chinese and Japanese translators. Graves transferred into Intelligence, a division of State that was highly mathematical, heavily computerized. He worked in the foreign division for five years, doing a lot of code breaking. At that time the foreign embassies were all utilizing computer-generated codes of various kinds, and it was challenging work - even if the messages usually turned out to be requests for funds to refurbish the ballroom on the second floor, or to hire additional kitchen help. Graves was interested in the codes, not in the content.

In 1970 he was moved to the domestic end. It seemed a minor change at the time, and a change he welcomed. He was ready to do something different. It was a long time before he realized just how different it was.

During his fifteen years in the government, slowly and imperceptibly his enemy had shifted from the Big Bear, the Russkies, the Reds, the ChiComs - to his fellow Americans. That was his job now, and he hated it. It was tapping telephone transmissions and competing with other agencies; it was value judgements and it was very, very political.

Nothing was clean and direct any more. And Graves didn't like it. Not any more.

Graves had been planning to quit State for a long time, ever since his domestic work had become distasteful. But he hadn't quit.

What kept him was partly inertia and partly the fear that he might be unable to teach Slavic or mathematics. At least, that was what he told himself. He was reluctant to admit the real reason, even to himself.

The fact was that he took a genuine pleasure in his work. The pleasure was abstract, the pleasure of a compulsive jigsaw puzzle worker who will fit the pieces together without caring what the puzzle really means. It was a game he loved to play, even if it was fundamentally nasty.

He also liked the notion of an opponent. In the foreign division he had been up against institutions -embassies, foreign press corps, political groups of various kinds. In the domestic division, it was most often a single individual.

Graves had long ago discovered his skill at poker, backgammon, and chess - games which required a combination of mathematical insight, memory, and psychological daring. To him the ideal was chess -one man pitted against another man, each trying to calculate the intentions of the other in a game of enormous complexity with many alternatives.

That was why he had agreed to leave Washington in order to follow the activities of John Wright. In the realm of puzzles and games, nothing was more challenging than John Wright.

He and Wright were well matched: the same intelligence, the same mathematical background, the same fondness for games, particularly chess and poker.

But now after three months, Phelps was rolling him up. Wright would be arrested; the game would be called off. Graves sighed, trying to tell himself that this did not represent a personal defeat. Yet it was; he knew it.

With a low whine the plane began its descent towards San Diego, skimming in over the roofs of the highest buildings. Graves didn't much like San Diego. It was a utilitarian town dominated by the needs of the Navy, which ran it with a firm, conservative hand. Even its sins were dreary: the downtown area was filled with bars, pool halls, and porno movie houses which advertised `Beaver films - direct from Frisco!' as if San Francisco were six thousand miles away and not just an hour up the coast. Fresh-faced sailors wandered all over the downtown area looking for something to do. They never seemed to understand that there was nothing to do. Except, possibly, to get drunk.

Despite the early hour San Diego was hot, and Graves was grateful for the car's air conditioning. Lewis drove away from the airport, glancing occasionally at Graves. `The marshals checked in with us an hour ago.'

`So you know?'

`Everybody knows. They're just waiting for you to say the word.'

As they left the airport they passed beneath a banner stretched across the road: WELCOME REPUBLICANS. Graves smiled. `I'm going to hold off for a while,' he said. `At least until this afternoon.'

Lewis nodded and said nothing. Graves liked that about him, his silence. He was young and enthusiastic - characteristics Graves severely lacked - but he knew when to keep his mouth shut. `We'll go directly to his apartment,' he said.

`All right,' Lewis said. He didn't ask why.

`What time did Wright quit last night?'

`Nine. Lights out at nine.'

`Rather early.' Graves frowned. It was rare for Wright to go to bed before midnight.,

`Duly noted on the time-clock sheets,' Lewis said. `I checked them myself this morning.'

`Has he ever done that before? Gone to bed at nine?'

`July fifth. He had the flu then, you remember.'

`But he's not sick now,' Graves said, and tugged at his ear. It was a nervous habit he had. And he was very nervous now.

There were a lot of cops stationed on the road from the airport to the city. Graves commented on it.

`You haven't heard?' Lewis said.

`Heard what?'

`The President's coming in today.'

`No,' Graves said. `When was that decided? This is only the second day. I'm surprised he'd show before he's nominated.'

`Everybody's surprised. Apparently he intends to address the Convention delegates before the balloting.'

`Oh?'

`Yeah.' Lewis smiled. `It's also apparently true that there are some squabbles in the rules committee and the platform committee. He's going to straighten that out.'

`Ah.' It was making more sense. The President was a practical politician. He'd sacrifice the drama of a grand entrance if he had to get a political job done earlier.

`We just got the word a couple of hours ago,' Lewis said. `Same with the police. They're furious. The Chief has been making statements about how hard it is to provide security…' He gestured at all the wait- ing cops. They were stationed every thirty yards or so along the road. `I guess he managed.'

`Looks like it. What time is he due?'

`Around noon, I think.'

They drove on in silence for a while, leaving the coast road and heading into the centre of town. Graves noticed that Broadway had been dressed up, its honkytonk glitter subdued a little. But there were a lot of tough-looking girls around.

Lewis commented on it. `The City Fathers are going crazy,' he said: `About that.' He jerked his thumb towards one spectacularly constructed girl in a tightly clinging pants suit.

`I thought it wasn't allowed.' Traditionally San Diego was free of hookers despite the large sailor population. Tijuana was just twenty minutes away; those services were usually provided across the border.

`Nothing they can do about it,' Lewis said. `Just in the last few hours they've all been coming in. Every damned hooker for a thousand miles is here. All the girls from Vegas and Reno and Tahoe. It's the Convention.'

`But the City Fathers don't like it.'

`The City Fathers hate it,' Lewis said, and grinned. It was a youthful grin, the grin of a person who still found sin amusing, risque, fun.

Graves could no longer find the fun in prostitution. Why not? he wondered. Was it age - or was it striking some uncomfortable chord in himself?

But he didn't pursue the thought. Lewis turned left, going up into the hilly section of town towards Wright's apartment.