Plague Ship

It was an incongruity of little importance, but Max was still surprised by it. He held out his hand. “Max Hanley.”

Je

“Oh, certainly. No problem. This is Eddie Seng, from the company that rescued my son, and this is Kyle.”

“Pleased to meet you, Doctor,” Eddie said. “Sorry we couldn’t tell you the name of the hotel until you arrived in Rome. Operational security.”

“I quite understand.” Je

“We’ll bring him back,” Adam Je

“I trust things went smoothly,” Je

“Actually, they didn’t,” Max told him.

“Really? What happened?”

The eyes, too, Max thought. There was something about them. Behind Je

“The Responsivists now employ armed guards,” Eddie said when Max didn’t respond.

Je

“You are being too modest, Mr. Seng. I’ve been in combat, so I understand what you’ve been through.” Vietnam, Max thought, putting Je

“Normally, we would hold an intervention with Kyle’s friends and family to let him know he has the support he needs to break away from the Responsivists. However, in this type of situation I will need to speak with Kyle alone for the first few sessions. It’s going to be quite a shock when he wakes up and realizes what’s happened to him.” Je

“Kyle’s not violent, if you’re concerned,” Max assured him. “Unlike his old man, the boy doesn’t have a temper.”

“I usually prescribe something to keep subjects calm anyway, until the shock wears off.” He waved one of his gloves at a side table where an old-fashioned black doctor’s bag was perched next to an arrangement of fresh flowers.

“How many people have you helped, Doctor.”

“Please, call me Adam. Well over two hundred.”

“All successful?”

“I wish I could say yes, but that’s not the case. I’ve had a handful commit suicide, and even more return to the cult. It’s sad, really. People get sucked in by what they perceive to be the good works of the Responsivists, but it’s only when they have been there for a while that the group begins to exert more and more control, especially by making its members lose contact with their loved ones. Once that happens, it is sometimes difficult to get them to return to their real lives.”

“Why do people let it happen?” Eddie asked, but he already knew the answer. It was the same in Chinatown when he was a kid. The pressure to join a gang was intense, and, once you did, they never let you go.

“Loneliness, a sense of disco

“According to his mother, Kyle’s been involved with Responsivism for only a few months, so I think he should be okay.”

“Duration has nothing to do with it,” Je

“I’m curious,” Eddie said into the gathering silence, “how does someone as successful as Do

“Same as everyone else. Just because she has awards and accolades and an entourage doesn’t mean she’s any less lonely than anyone else. Oftentimes, celebrities are more estranged from reality than most and are easily swayed. Out in the real world, she’s mobbed by fans, but within the organization she’s just Do

“I will never understand any of this,” Max groaned.

“Which is why you hired me.” Je

“Do you know anything about a Responsivist center in the Philippines?” Eddie asked to change the subject.

Je

“What about leasing a cruise ship?”

“You’re talking about the Golden Dawn? What a horrible tragedy. I suspect that is what they call a Sea Retreat. They have done that a number of times over the past couple of years. They often lease out an entire ship, or book at least half the cabins, and hold meetings and discuss the movement. I went on one just to see what it was all about. It seemed to me that it was a recruiting tool to get at lonely widows still flush with their late husbands’ pensions.”

Je

When he was out of the room, Max crossed to the sideboard where bottles of liquor were lined up like soldiers on parade. He splashed some whiskey into a cut-glass tumbler and indicated to Eddie if he wanted one, too. The former spook declined.

“This isn’t a mission,” Max said, taking a sip. “You don’t need to teetotal.”

“Just the same. So what do you think?”

“I think we hit the jackpot with him. He certainly knows what he’s dealing with. You?”

“I agree. Linda did a great job finding him, and I’m sure that Kyle will be fine.”

“Thanks for babysitting us,” Max said, but there was much more behind the words.

“You’d do the same for any of us.”

Max’s cell phone purred. He reached into his pocket for it. The caller ID read CHAIRMAN.

“We’re here, safe and sound,” he said by way of greeting.

“Glad to hear it,” Cabrillo replied. “Was Je

“Yes. Eddie and I were just talking about how lucky we feel to have found him.”