INTERVENTION (43 page)

As Jamie squelched along, cogitating, he was oblivious of other pedestrians on the High Street. There weren't many, since it was nearly one in the morning and the mist was thickening to drizzle. Normally, he would have taken a bus from Nigel's place to his own home a mile away in the northern New Town, but he'd wanted to give his anger a chance to cool, besides mulling over what would have to be done next. Set up safeguards for his own people in the morning. Then excurse to America and tackle Denis. Or should he do that as soon as he got home? What time was it in bloody New Hampshire, anyhow?...

He was just short of North Bridge when the two superimposed mental images struck him like a physical blow.

Alana!

And the Unknown.

... Alana Shaunavon, his most talented EE adept, shivering with her witch-green eyes full of apprehension after a perfectly harmless jaunt to Tokyo, gripping the arms of the barber's chair white-knuckled and confessing that she'd had a flash of dire foreboding. Impending disaster. He'd reassured her, then forgotten the matter until Nigel Weinstein alerted him to the attempted subversion. And now Alana's face sprang to Jamie's mind again—from his memory or from somewhere else—projecting a second warning...

...that was savagely blotted out by the mental override of the Unknown. A man, physically present nearby, strongly operant.

Turn right MacGregor into the next close.

The compulsion was irresistibly exerted. The intent was murderous.

Jamie was both stunned and incredulous. An
operant
enemy? But that was impossible! Both Denis and Tamara had flatly assured him that their governments had no operant agents. Denis had checked Langley many times with his seekersense and Tamara had subjected the files of both the KGB and GRU to remote-view scrutiny.

"Who's there?" Jamie called. And then telepathically: What do you want? Where are you?

Come in here under the archway.

Helpless, Jamie turned off the High Street into the entry of the close, one of those narrow urban canyons peculiar to Edinburgh's Old Town that gave access to the warrens of tenement blocks. The corridor was nearly pitch-dark in the mist. Jamie had no penetrating clairvoyance that would spotlight the way, no dowsing ability that might identify the mentality coercing him. He stumbled on irregular pavement and nearly took a header, then managed to orient himself by looking up at the sky, which shone a faint golden gray above the silhouetted roofs and chimney pots.

"Who are you?" Jamie demanded. American? Russian?
Sassenach?!

Keep walking.

His footsteps splashed and echoed in a narrow alleyway. He came out into a broader courtyard where there was a bit of fuzzy illumination from a building on the right and saw an insubstantial figure, standing still.

Come closer to me.

What the devil do you want?

Let's just get this over with.

Jamie battled the coercion, reeling like a drunken man, but his betraying legs carried him on toward the waiting Unknown. He tried to shout out loud, but his vocal cords now seemed paralyzed. Strangely, he was not afraid, only more than ever furious. First Nigel—now him!

The Unknown held a narrow tube, no larger than a biro, with a faint metallic gleam. He pointed this at Jamie.

Closer. Closer.

Don't be a bloody fool! Jamie's mind shouted. You won't stop EE by killing me...

In retrospect, Jamie was never quite sure what happened next. Strong arms suddenly grasped him from behind and hauled him off his feet. He got his voice back and uttered a bellow that rang up and down the close. The Unknown swore out loud, crouched, and thrust out the cylinder. Jamie heard a sharp hiss. Then he was wrenched violently to one side by the person who had seized him and fell in a heap onto the slippery stones, striking his head. Roman candles popped in the vault of his skull and he heard running footsteps receding into the distance.

"How're you doing, man? Did he hurt you?"

Dim flame of butane cigarette-lighter. Deep-set eyes and touseled fair hair glistening in the drizzle. A burly man wearing a duffel coat, bending over him. A wry but friendly smile.

"I think I'm all right," Jamie said. "Bit of a bump."

His rescuer nodded, extended a big hand, and helped Jamie climb to his feet. Although he was not young he was built like a stevedore, and he topped Jamie's six feet three inches. He held the lighter high, and its blue flame gave a surprising amount of light.

"Your friend the mugger seems to have run off. Did he get your wallet?"

"No." Jamie used his handkerchief to dry his wet hands and explored the lump on his head with caution. "Thanks very much for your help."

"Good thing I happened along. Now and again I use this close as a short cut. Want me to hunt up a policeman?"

"No ... it wouldn't do much good, would it? As you said, he's gone. I'd rather go home."

"Whatever you say." The lighter snapped off. "But take my advice and stick to lighted streets after this. Better yet, take a taxi. You'll find one back there on the High Street."

"Yes, well—"

The man in the duffel coat started off in the direction taken by the fleeing Unknown, calling over his shoulder with conventional good humor, "Get along now. We'd really hate to lose you."

***

"A suggestive remark, that," Jean commented.

"And with that he was off." Jamie drew her more tightly against him, the palms of his hands enclosing her breasts as though they were talismans through which the healing magic flowed. "And it's only now, when I'm able to think clearly, that I realize how odd it was that he was able to see that I was in mortal danger. It's not as though the operant mugger had a gun or a knife. There was only the wee tube thing there in the dark. I was certain it'd be the death of me because the bugger's mind assured me of the fact—but how did my Good Samaritan know?"

Tell me the answer, said his wife's mind.

My rescuer was an operant too he must have been and that means ... of course it's only logical that there should be others but good God that they should be
watching us!

"You aren't inconspicuous," she said, laughing softly. "As you said, it's logical."

They lay together, naked before the fire, on a rug she'd made herself of pieced black and white Islay sheepskins. When he had come home, raging with worry and fear, she had closed her mind to him and not permitted him to tell the story until she had administered the great sovereign remedy there in the dark library, their private sanctum. Then she'd listened calmly.

He said, "We'll have to work out some ways to guard ourselves, until the public demonstration can be arranged. All of the EE adepts will be at risk. Aside from the mysterious assassin, there are the government agents lurking about. The CIA for certain—and if the two who talked to Nigel are to be believed, there are Russians and Israelis and even British agents to worry about..."

"You think they might try kidnaping if other recruitment tactics fail?"

"It's a possibility," he said somberly.

She kissed his wrist lightly. "What you must do then is steal a march on the lot of them. For Whitehall, a preview of coming attractions, demonstrating how an EE adept would react to involuntary sequestration by going out of body and raising a hue and cry among his colleagues. For the Yanks, a suggestion that Whitehall pass on the good word, with a judicious warning against poaching. For the others, a more devious approach. You and your colleagues will have to descend to cloak-and-daggering. Excurse into the appropriate embassies in London—and perhaps in Paris as well—and find out whether there are any nefarious schemes being planned against you. If there are, take the aforementioned steps."

Jamie gave a delighted laugh. "Damn, but you're a cool one!"

She grabbed him by his Dundrearies and pulled his face close. "Only because I don't think the intelligence people want to harm you. They don't know enough about you yet, my dear, for that. But your mystery man, the operant mugger, is something else altogether. He frightens me, and I have no notion at all how you can protect yourself from a person like that. He came from nowhere and vanished back into it. You know nothing of his motives. He may even have been a madman—"

"No," said Jamie. "He was sane."

"Then perhaps he's been frightened off by the other one. We can pray that it's so. And you can follow your rescuer's advice and take care not to travel in lonely places."

"Not while I'm in my body, at least," he said, and he kissed her lips, and they lay together for a few minutes more watching the fire die, and then went off to bed.

ZÜRICH, SWITZERLAND, EARTH

5
SEPTEMBER
1991

T
HE ELEVEN MEN
and one woman who constituted the PRD, the banking regulatory board of Switzerland, watched without emotion as the confidential agent known as Otto Maurer showed his videotape of the photographed documents that verified the nature of Dr. James Somerled MacGregor's researches.

"It is now confirmed beyond a doubt," Maurer said, "that the psychic procedure for remote clairvoyant viewing is reliably practiced by no less than thirty individuals connected with the Parapsychology Unit at Edinburgh University, plus an undetermined number of other persons in other parts of the world who have made use of the mental programming techniques for this—uh—talent, as perfected by Professor MacGregor and his associates. Pursuant to my instructions, I have assembled other documentation from the Psychology Department, the Astronomy Department, and the Office of Media Relations for the Medical School of the University of Edinburgh. This material confirms that on or about twenty-two October of this year, MacGregor will hold a briefing for world media announcing...
and demonstrating
this psychic espionage technique."

The twelve banking directors uttered varied cries of dismay. Maurer lowered his head in a momentary gesture of commiseration, then said, "It is needless to belabor the obvious. MacGregor's researches effectively write 'finis' to the confidentiality of the Swiss banking system. Additionally, widespread utilization of psychic espionage will trigger chaos in every stock market, commodity exchange, and financial institution throughout the world, opening virtually any transaction to the danger of public scrutiny ... This concludes my report, Messieurs and Madame, and I await your questions and instructions."

The woman asked, "This MacGregor—has he any radical political affiliation? Is he a Red? An anarchist? Or simply an ivory-tower academic unaware of the potentially disastrous consequences of his actions?"

"He is none of these things, Madame Boudry. MacGregor is a Scot and a fierce idealist. It is military secrecy he seeks to demolish by introducing this psychic spy technique, thinking thereby to preclude the possibility of nuclear war. The collapse of the world financial structure would seem to him a small price to pay for peace."

There was an appalled silence.

A stout, placid-looking man asked, "You have explored avenues of—of influence that might deter him from his demonstration?"

Maurer nodded. "I have, Herr Gimel, but without conspicuous success. He is fearless, in spite of an attempt upon his life last April and intensive surveillance by a number of state security agencies. He would be affronted by any attempt at bribery. His position at the university is impregnable, and his professional status is beyond reproach so there is no chance of his work being discredited before or after the fact."

"His personal life?" Gimel inquired.

Maurer spoke in English. "Squeaky clean."

The bankers chuckled bitterly. A frail, ill-looking man with burning eyes leaned toward the agent and quavered, "Are you telling us that there is no way of stopping this man?"

"No licit way, Herr Reichenbach."

The invalid clasped the edge of the mahogany table with skeletal hands. "Maurer! You will have to think about this matter urgently. It is of paramount importance to us, to your country's continuing prosperity. Find a way to stop this demonstration—or, failing that, a way to delay it. MacGregor himself is the key to the problem! Do you understand me?"

"I'm not sure, Herr Reichenbach..."

"It is privacy that this psychic madman threatens. A fundamental right of humanity! This thing you have shown us, this technique of spying, is a nightmare out of George Orwell that any right-thinking person would repudiate with horror. You say MacGregor hopes for peace. I say MacGregor is the greatest menace civilization has ever known. Think of it. Psychic overseers scrutinizing every action of business, politics, even our personal lives. Think of it!"

Maurer's eyes swept around the broad-room table. The other eleven PRD members were nodding their heads in solemn affirmation.

"Do something," old Reichenbach whispered. "Think very carefully, then do something."

FROM THE MEMOIRS OF ROGATIEN REMILLARD

T
HAT FIRST YEAR
of mine in Hanover was very difficult. There is inevitably a lot of hard work involved in getting a new business off the ground, and my Eloquent Page bookshop was strictly a one-man operation. Early in 1991 I traveled a lot, hitting sales and thrift shops and jobbers all over New England as I gathered the basic stock of used fantasy and science-fiction titles that were to be my specialty. I ordered new books as well—not only fiction but also science nonfiction of the type that I thought might appeal to my hoped-for clientele. When spring came and the shop was pretty well filled I opened the doors to walk-in customers and began to prepare catalogs for the mail-order trade. Denis and his Coterie were faithful patrons. They even sent their student subjects along through subtle application of the coercer's art.

My nephew was always urging me to participate in this or that experiment at his lab, but I invariably declined. The place crawled with earnest young students, all gung ho for the advancement of metapsychology, who made me feel like a scapegrace fogy when I refused to share their enthusiasm. And then there was the Coterie. Except for Sally Doyle, who was earthy and nonjudgmental, and her husband Tater McAllister, who had a wacko sense of humor in spite of being a theoretical physicist, the Coterie did not consist of folks I would have freely chosen as drinking buddies. They were fanatically loyal to Denis and his goals and did not suffer the heretical mutterings of the Great Man's uncle with equanimity. My reluctance to sacrifice myself on the altar of mental science was viewed as semitreasonable by Denis's chief associate, Glenn Dalembert, by Losier and Tremblay, who ran the main operancy test program, and by the mystic medicine man, Tukwila Barnes. Colette Roy, Dalembert's wife, reacted to my negativism with the perky hopefulness of a camp counselor confronting a recalcitrant eight-year-old. But she moved me not a whit more than did Eric Boutin, the strapping ex-mechanic, whose toothy grin did not quite conceal his itch to whip me into tiptop mental shape, for my own good as well as the good of the cause.