24
GIDEON FINALLY RELAXED as they left the maze of dirt roads behind and exited onto Highway 4 near Jemez Springs. They had not, to his relief, been chased or followed from the Paiute Creek Ranch. He slowed the Suburban as they eased through town, the streets thronging with tourists down from Santa Fe.
During the wild drive out of the mountains, Connie Rust—in the backseat with Fordyce—had fallen quiet. Now she began to whimper, over and over again. “What’s going to happen to me?”
“Nothing bad,” said Fordyce, his voice calm, reassuring. “We’re here to help you. I’m sure you’ve heard about what your ex-husband was involved in.”
This brought another bout of sobbing.
“We just want to ask you some questions, that’s all.” Gideon listened as Fordyce explained—with infinite patience, as if speaking to a child—that they had a subpoena, which required her to answer all their questions truthfully, but that she had nothing to worry about, that she was not a suspect, that she would not be locked up, and that in fact she was a very important person whose help they were depending on. He continued on in a deep-voiced murmur, gently overriding Rust’s self-pitying outbursts, until she appeared to calm down.
A final sniffle. “What do you want to know?”
“My colleague,” said Fordyce, “Gideon Crew, used to work with your ex-husband up in Los Alamos. He’ll be asking the questions.”
Gideon heard this with surprise.
“Meanwhile,” Fordyce went on, “we’re going to switch drivers so he can talk to you undistracted.” He turned to Gideon. “Right, partner?”
Gideon pulled over.
Outside the car, Fordyce took him aside. “You knew Chalker,” he murmured. “You know what to ask.”
“But you’re the interrogation expert,” Gideon protested in a whisper.
“She’s ready to talk now.”
Gideon got into the backseat next to her. She was still sniffling, dabbing at her nose with a Kleenex but otherwise calm. She even looked a little pleased at the attention. Gideon felt at a loss. Interrogations were not his thing.
Fordyce started up the car and pulled back out onto the road, driving slowly.
“Um,” said Gideon, wondering where the hell to start. “Like Agent Fordyce said, I was a colleague of your ex-husband’s up on the Hill.”
She nodded dumbly.
“We were friends. I think you and I met once.” He thought it better not to remind her it was at the Christmas party where she got drunk.
She looked at him again, and he was shocked at the depth of disorientation in those eyes. “Sorry, I just don’t remember you.”
What to ask? He racked his brains. “During your marriage, did Reed ever show an interest in Islam?”
She shook her head.
“What about his work? Did he ever express any negative views about what he was doing up at the lab, with bombs and such?”
“He was gung ho about his work. Proud of it. Disgusting.” She blew her nose. Talking about Chalker seemed to clear her mind—somewhat.
“Why disgusting?”
“He was a tool of the military-industrial complex and never realized it.”
“Did he ever express any views against the United States? Express sympathy for any terrorist organizations?”
“No. He was a flag waver from way back. You should’ve seen him after 9/11. ‘Nuke the bastards.’ Little did he know Bush and Cheney organized the whole thing.”
Gideon did not venture a comment on this opinion. “Didn’t it then seem strange to you that he converted to Islam?”
“Not at all. When we were married, he used to drag me to the Zen center for meditations, to these pseudo-Indian Native American Church meetings, EST, Scientology, the Moonies—you name it, he tried it.”
“So he was sort of a spiritual seeker.”
“That’s a nice way of putting it. He was a pain in the ass.”
“Why did you divorce?”
She sniffled. “Just what I said: he was a pain in the ass.”
“Did you remain in contact with him after your divorce?”
“He tried to. I was sick and tired of him. When I joined the ranch, he finally left me alone. Willis read him the riot act.”
“Riot act?”
“Yes. Willis told him he would beat the crap out of him if he contacted me again. So he didn’t. He was a coward.”
Fordyce suddenly spoke from the front seat. “Do you and Willis have a relationship?”
“We did. Then he dedicated himself to celibacy.”
Yeah, right, thought Gideon, recalling the young woman he had glimpsed lolling in a bed next to Willis’s office.
“So what’s the idea behind the ranch, the purpose of it?” asked Fordyce.
“We’ve seceded from this bogus country. We’re off the grid, self-sufficient. We grow all our own food, we take care of each other. We’re the harbingers of a new age.”
“And why is this necessary?”
“You people are prisoners of your government. You have no idea. Your politicians are suffering from the disease of power. It’s totally corrupt and yet you don’t see it.”
“What do you mean by ‘the disease of power’?” Fordyce asked.
“All power structures, by their very nature, eventually get taken over by psychopaths. Almost all governments in the world have been taken over by gifted psychopaths who have a great command of human psychology and use normal people to their advantage. This race of pathological deviants can’t feel compassion, they have no conscience. They have an insatiable need for power—and they rule the world.”
It was a recited speech and it had a shopworn air, although it was not without interest, at least to Gideon. He had occasionally felt that way himself.
“So what do you plan to do about it?” Fordyce asked.
“We’ll sweep it all away and start afresh.”
“How will you sweep it away?” asked Gideon.
She suddenly shut up, her lips tightening.
After a moment, Fordyce asked: “So what do you do at the ranch?”
“I was originally part of the technical team, but now I work in the garden.”
“Technical team?”
“That’s right.” She tilted her head up pathetically. “We’re no Luddites. We embrace technology. The revolution will be delivered with technology.”
“What kind of technology?”
“Internet, the web, mass communications. You saw our satellite dishes. We’re highly connected.”
“Will the revolution be violent?” asked Gideon pleasantly.
“The psychopaths will not leave voluntarily,” she said grimly.
They were approaching the outskirts of Santa Fe, passing the prison, the grasslands giving way to suburban developments. “Any interest at the ranch in your ex-husband’s work?” asked Fordyce. “I mean, he designed atomic weapons. Might be a good way to sweep away the psychopaths.”
More silence. Then, “That’s not the reason I was invited.”
“Why were you invited?” said Fordyce.
“Because…Willis loved me.”
This pathetic declaration was the last thing she would say. No matter how they asked or cajoled, she remained silent. They delivered the grim witness to the NEST central command complex in Santa Fe without her speaking another word.
“Let ’em have sloppy seconds,” said Fordyce as they left, gunning the car and heading north. “We’re off to see the imam.”