The Brethren

"Do you know where my office is?"

"My driver can find it. Thanks, Mr. Carson."

Just call me Trevor, he almost said. But she was gone.

They watched as he wrung his hands together, then pumped his fists, gritted his teeth, said, "Yes!" He'd hooked a big one.

Jan appeared from the hall and said, "Well?"

"She'll be here at one-thirty. Get this place cleaned up a little."

"I'm not a maid. Can you get some money up front? I need to pay bills."

"I'll get the damned money."

Trevor attacked his bookshelves, straightening volumes he hadn't touched in years, dusting the planks with a paper towel, stung files in drawers. When he charged his desk, Jan finally felt a twinge of guilt and began vacuuming the reception area.

They labored through lunch, their bitching and straining making for great amusement across the street.

No sign of Mrs. Beltrone at one-thirty.

"Where the hell is she?" Trevor barked down the hall just after two.

"Maybe she checked around, got some more references" Jansaid.

What did you say?" he yelled.

"Nothing, boss "

"Call her." he demanded at two-thirty-

"She didn't leave a number."

"You didn't get a number?"

"That's not what I said. I said she didn't leave a number."

At three-thirty Trevor stormed out of his office, still trying desperately to uphold his end of a raging argument with a woman he'd fired at least ten times in the past eight years.

They followed him straight to Trumble. He was in the prison for fifty-three minutes, and when he left it was after five, too late to drop off mail in either Neptune Beach or Atlantic Beach. He returned to his office and left his briefcase on his desk. Then, predictably, he went to Pete's for drinks and di

EIGHTEEN

The unit from Langley flew to Des Moines, where the agents rented two cars and a van, then drove forty minutes to Bakers, Iowa. They arrived in the quiet, snowbound little town two days before the letter. By the time Quince picked it up at the post office, they knew the names of the postmaster, the mayor, the chief of police, and the short-order cook at the pancake house next to the hardware store. But no one in Bakers knew them.

They watched Quince hurry to the bank after leaving the post office. Thirty minutes later, two agents known only as Chap and Wes found the corner of the bank where Mr. Garbe, Jr., did business, and they presented themselves to his secretary as inspectors from the Federal Reserve. They certainly looked official -dark suits, black shoes, short hair, long overcoats, clipped speech, efficient ma

Quince was locked inside, and at first seemed unwilling to come out. They impressed upon his secretary the urgency of their visit, and after almost forty minutes the door opened slightly. Mr. Garbe looked as though he'd been crying. He was pale, shaken, unhappy with the prospect of entertaining anyone. But he showed them in anyway, too u

He sat across the massive desk, and looked at the twins facing him. "What can we do for you?" he asked, with a very faint smile.

"Is the door locked?" Chap asked.

"Why yes, it is." The twins got the impression that most of Mr. Garbe's day was spent behind locked doors.

"Can anyone hear us?" Wes asked.

"No." Quince was even more rattled now.

"We're not reserve officials, Chap said. "We lied."

Quince wasn't sure if he should be angry or relieved or even more frightened, so he just sat there for a second, mouth open, frozen, waiting to be shot.

"It's a long story." Wes said.

"You've got five minutes."

"Actually, we have as long as we want."

"This is my office. Get out."

"Not so fast. We know some things."

"I'll call security"

"No you won't."

"We've seen the letter," Chap said. "The one you just got from the post office."

"I picked up several."

"But only one from Ricky."

Quince's shoulders sagged, his eyes closed slowly. Then they opened again and looked at the tormentors in total, absolute defeat. "Who are you?" he mumbled.

"We're not enemies."

"You're working for him, aren't you?" Him.

"Ricky, or whoever the hell he is."

"No," Wes said. "He's our enemy too. Let's just say that we have a client who's in the same boat you're in, more or less.We've been hired to protect him."

Chap pulled a thick envelope from his coat pocket and tossed it on the desk. "There's twenty-five thousand cash. Send it to Ricky"

Quince stared at the envelope, his mouth open wide. His poor brain was choked with so many thoughts he was dizzy. So he closed his eyes again, and squinted fiercely in a vain effort to organize things. Forget the question of who they were. How did they read the letter? Why were they offering him money? How much did they know?

He sure as hell couldn't trust them.

"The money's yours," Wes said. "In return, we need some information."

"Who is Ricky?" Quince asked, his eyes barely open.

",What do you know about him?" Chap asked.

"His name's not Ricky."

"True."

"He's in prison."

"True," Chap said again.

"Says he has a wife and children."

"Partially true. The wife is now an ex-wife. The children are still his."

"Says they're destitute, and that's why he's scamming people."

"Not exactly. His wife is quite wealthy, and his children have followed the money. We're not sure why he's scamming people."

"But we'd like to stop him," Chap added. "We need your help."

Quince suddenly realized that for the first time in his life, in all of his fifty-one years, he was sitting in the presence of two living, breathing people who knew he was a homosexual. The knowledge terrified him. For a second he wanted to deny it, to concoct some story of how he carne to know Ricky, but invention failed him. He was too scared to be inspired.

Then he realized that these two, whoever they were, could ruin him. They knew his little secret, and they had the power to wreck his life.

And they were offering $25,000 cash?

Poor Quince covered his eyes with his knuckles and said, "What do you want?"

Chap and Wes thought he was about to cry. They didn't particularly care, but there was no need for it. "Here's the deal, Mr. Garbe." said Chap. "You take the money lying there on your desk, and you tell us everything about Ricky. Show us your letters. Show us everything. If you have a file or a box or some secret place where you've hidden everything, we'd like to see it. Once we've gathered all we need, then we'll leave. We'll disappear as quickly as we've come, and you'll never know who we are or who we're protecting."

"And you'll keep the secrets?"

"Absolutely"

"There's no reason for us to tell anyone about you." Wes added.

"Can you make him stop?" Quince asked, staring at them.

Chap and Wes paused and glanced at each other. Their responses had been perfect so far, but this question had no clear answer. "We can't promise, Mr. Garbe." Wes said. "But we'll try our best to put this Ricky character out of business. As we said, he's upsetting our client too."

"You've got to protect me on this."

"We'll do all we can."

Suddenly Quince stood and leaned forward with his palms flat on the desk. "Then I have no choice." he a

Just as he opened the file, an offensive, high-pitched voice squawked through the intercom, "Mr. Garbe, your father would like to see you immediately."