The Program

Chapter twenty-four

Weapons of influence." Bederman settled into an outmoded armchair. "They've accompanied us into our most shameful hours. Witch-hunts. Blacklists. Death camps. Between the pages of suicide-terrorist training manuals. Up a con man's sleeve."

Tim set down his cup of now-cold tea, the cushioned wicker couch creaking with his movement. The country-decorated ranch house, located in the better section of Westwood just north of the university, could have been acquired from the producers of Mister Ed: checkerboard curtains, horsehair rugs, and a barn-red front door with white crosspieces. Save the bars on the windows, the lineup of dead bolts, and the occasional bleep of the security system, the place was old and homey and bizarre for a single man in his sixties. A cinnamon candle burned somewhere out of sight. Tim decided that Bederman was either a widower or he'd inherited his mother's house; if he were gay, he'd surely have better taste.

"Betters has added some clever, malicious riffs to an age-old song." Bederman polished his spectacles. "Vertical emotional dependence, directed deference to authority, a tightly controlled system of pseudologic, internal language walling up the insiders, dislocating newcomers. He's married two cult models, the psychotherapeutic cult and the self-improvement cult – think the Sullivanians meet Lifespring. Tell me the Program Source Code again?"

"Take sole responsibility for your life. Delete your Old Programming. Overwrite your Old Programming with your New Programming. Maximize your growth by minimizing your negativity. Negate Victimhood. Your behavior is for you. Exalt strength, not comfort. Strive for fulfillment, not happiness. Get with The Program." Tim could almost hear the chants in his head as he named them.

"And our dear friend Tom Altman wisely presented as a doer. I'm sure the Teacher sized you up as such – that's the biggest type of fish to fry for this kind of cult. Believers are automatically out, thinkers get tangled up in the logic, and feelers are too easy – no challenge for a show-man like TD. Doers are men and women of action, which means they've almost certainly made mistakes in the past for which they hold some measure of remorse that can be turned against them. They also tend to have financial resources and they make great subleaders. I'm not surprised you made the cut from the LGAT -"